Kamikaze
by 2theSky
Summary: Annoying the Occupation sounds like a good way to spend time on the Grid... especially when you're stuck there. Just don't get yourself killed in the process... (Embers series- Book Two)
1. Prologue

(Mac's POV)

I couldn't believe I managed to pull it off.

Skigh felt so light as I carried her, her breathing getting worse. "Just a little longer, Skigh," I whispered, looking around to make sure no one was following us. I'd been glancing around constantly for a while now, ever since I managed to get her out of the hospital. Surprisingly, that had been the easy part.

The harder part was carrying her. Skigh was very small, so her weight wasn't the problem. But with all her injuries, and the casts and wraps covering them, I had a hard time making sure I didn't hit one of them and hurt her more.

The hospital gown wasn't the best thing to wear here. It could've given her, or us, away in a second. I would have to fix that.

But her injuries came first.

The hard ground beneath my feet seemed to continue forever. The snow wasn't helping my vision.

Skigh shivered. I really wished I had my coat right now, or any coat, that way she could stay warm. For me, it wasn't too bad, but for her, she must have been freezing.

Through the snow, I noticed a place where I could probably lay her down and make sure she could rest. Without the machines, I was worried that I would be the cause of her death.

I couldn't even see how big this shelter was, but as I stepped inside the outcropping, I figured it was a decent size. I laid Skigh down and made sure she was okay. I brushed her hair out of her face and sighed.

This would not be easy.

The first part was going to be pretty easy, compared to the rest.

I had to get rid of the hospital gown. If anyone saw her in that, we'd both be dead.

Yes, the easiest part… I hoped.

Tapping my watch, I played around with the codes and holograms. This, hopefully would work. I didn't want to result to the alternative. "Please let this work, please let this work…" The alternative wasn't something I was even remotely ready for.

A small blue and black clip rezzed up in my hand, the light blue outline, then the black frame and finally the blue lights. I wrapped my fingers around the cold, dull hospital gown's edge at the bottom and clipped it on. I sighed in relief as the gown transformed into a light pink and purple, and glowing, dress. It was pretty short, but I wasn't done yet.

Under the dress, a black suit slowly covered Skigh's small body in black squares. Light blue lights appeared on the black, followed by the secondary color, purple. Her upper arms were left bare. The scars on the back of her hands were covered in black, and the scar on her upper left arm was covered in a black band with a purple cross. (I never noticed the REVOLUTION logo- the Tron "T" with an extra square on the top and the bottom- carved into her arm, with slashes through it, before.) The scar on her neck I couldn't cover, but it wasn't too bad.

The fresh scars from her accident (pushing someone out of a crosswalk and then getting hit by a car, and then rolling across the pavement) were still deep red. I knelt beside her. Gently turning Skigh onto her side, I grabbed the disc that had also appeared on her back. So far, so good.

* * *

"No, no getting up." I gently pushed Skigh back down as she tried to push herself up.

After getting rid of her casts and the wraps covering her injuries, I had managed to undo the damage. No more scars, no more broken bones, and no more chance of her slipping into a coma, and I still had no clue what a "coma" was.

When I created her suit, I also made it possible for her to have some coding, that way the injuries could be deleted.

Skigh was pale, which would make her blend in more around here. Although I'd managed to repair her injuries, she would still be very tired. Her brown eyes, usually having a deep glow, were dull. I grabbed her again as she tried to sit up again. "No," I said, laying her back down. "You're going to be very weak, and moving around won't help."

"T-This bed i-is hard," Skigh mumbled. The way she spoke just proved how weak she was. I smoothed her long blonde hair.

"You're not in a bed," I said, starting to run my hand through her hair again.

Skigh groaned and blinked. "You l-look d-different."

I nodded and smiled. My hair was still black and blue, just with a lot more, and a lot more noticeable, blue. "I know."

"The h-hospital floor is very hard," Skigh muttered, starting to sit up. She was going to sit up even if it killed her, so I helped her lean against a wall.

I wondered how she'd react to this. "Skigh," I began slowly, "you're not in the hospital."

"Wha…?" Skigh rubbed her head. "Sorry, I'm still really out of it. What was that?"

"Skigh, in case you haven't noticed, you're not in the hospital anymore."

Skigh jumped. "Is that why everything's so dark? And hard?" This time she tried to stand.

I grabbed her arm and eased her back down the cave floor, sitting beside her. "You should probably be sitting down when I tell you where you are."

"I can take it standing," Skigh laughed as she sat again. She seemed to be feeling better already. That was good.

I took a deep breath. "Skigh?"

"Yeah? Come on, Mac, spill it! I can take it. Where are we?"

I took another deep breath. "Skigh, you're- we're- on the Grid."

* * *

_Okay, so this story continues where Beautiful Mystery left off._

_i'm thankful for any reviews so... :)_

_have a good day, everyone! :)_


	2. Chapter 1

**PART ONE: CAN'T SHUT UP**

**"This much I know- I am not alone, and I know I'm not the only one who found their way Home..." -Anthem Lights**

* * *

"Okay, apparently, we're out past curfew."

I sighed. "Okay, now I'm the one in the dark. When is curfew?"

Mac laughed and muttered, "It's when all the Recognizers come out." He jumped back into the cave as another orange and black ominous Recognizer went past; the way those things were designed made them radiate evil.

I shivered as another one trailed after it. "Is something going on?"

"No, probably not. If we see one," he stopped, his glowing green eyes (yeesh, on the Grid, even his pupils were green) connecting with my mud brown ones, "Run. The only way to avoid those is to run for it and hope you don't end up derezzed."

"Gee, I am really loving the sadistic feel of this place. What do you do when you meet someone new? Slice off their arm?"

McKian sighed, his hair falling into his face. On the Grid, his hair wasn't as dark. It was blue that faded into grey, and then into black. His skin was almost chalk white, which I figured was normal for a program.

As yet another Recognizer went past and illuminated the cave, I glanced down at my skin. This suit, and this dress... this whole thing was a little too surreal.

I. Was. GLOWING. Looking at the colored circuits made little technicolor dots dance in front of my eyes wherever I looked.

Yeah, this was gonna take some getting used to.

Mac groaned. "Okay, we can't stay here."

"Oh, so going out there with the big orange thingys of doom that want to haul us away in the night is better?" I covered my mouth and giggled, wishing that he'd stop making eye contact.

McKian rolled his eyes, and he looked like he was blushing a little. Yep, doing great so far. "I can tell you're feeling better. That sense of humor's back."

"Shut up."

We both started laughing. For the first time, as tears started rolling down my cheeks from laughing, I noticed that Mac's suit from when we first met (dude collapses on my floor after coming through my computer, blah, blah, blah, my friend Matt found out, blah, blah, blah- long story) was back. The greenish-yellow lights and the pale blue ones looked much brighter here.

We stopped after a few minutes, or at least what felt like a few minutes. Mac mumbled something, tapping his watch and a baton appearing in his hand. A second one appeared beside it, one with green glowing rims around the ends and middle, the other glowing purple. "Here." He handed me the purple one. I weighed the black and purple baton, wondering if I could really drive this thing. I knew it was a lot like a motorcycle, and those I could handle. Mac smirked. "Now's as good a time as any to master that."

I bit my lip and nodded, hoping I wouldn't end up destroying the thing. Hopefully, this- whatever Mac had bouncing around in that crazy brain of his- would end well.

Mac stepped outside, glancing around and darting around the entrance of the cave like a squirrel. Man, this guy was fast! I could only wish that I'd be that athletic.

With my past, and my injuries, never gonna happen.

He motioned for me to come out. As I did, i noticed that the sky was a very dim blue. "That's the sky?"

"Yeah, no warm and inviting sun. But the Recognizers really lighten it up."

I smiled. " Yeah, nothing like the warm glow of something carrying you to your death. Um, where are we going now?"

Suddenly, a blue streak raced past. Mac frowned. "That way," he said, pointing in the direction of the light wall. McKian rezzed his lightcycle, jumped, and landed on his rezzed up bike, the black frame outlined with bright green.

I took a deep breath and prayed that I could copy what he did. I ran, the jumped and twisted the baton. I breathed a sigh of relief as I landed on the bike. I could see some purple lights with my peripheral vision, but now wasn't the time to focus on the tiny details.

Now was the time to make sure I knew what I was doing on this God-forsaken thing.

I sped up and drifted alongside McKian. Mac grinned. "Someone's got the hang of it."

I rolled my eyes. "For now." We both increased our speed, the snowy mountains and debris in the outlands becoming a blur. The bright blue wall kept stretching out in front of us, as did the vast space that the outlands covered.

The Grid was massive; I could see that already. I'd seen quite a bit from what Mac had shown me before and from exploring it on my own, but the images transforming from the next to the next on the computer screen never did it justice. My only complaint?

Dark.

The Grid was just too dark.

Even with all the lights, the cool gadgets, and the amazing design, there was an evil feeling swirling around us.

As I twisted around the debri with Mac, I wondered if the Grid could be fixed. Maybe-

The bike swerved as I ran over a rock. Mac looked back. "You okay?"

I nodded. "Yeah, I'm-"

"HALT, PROGRAMS. YOU ARE IN VIOLATION OF CURFEW."

The blinding light and the deafening noise of the Recognizer over us didn't give it away at all, now did it? I glanced at Mac. "Do they have guns?"

"Let's not find out."

We kept following the blue light wall left behind by... someone. Some program hadn't even bothered to ditch the thing...

Weird.

Mac swerved between the cliffs, his bike really falling as he almost laid the thing completely on it's side. I copied him, and feeling the ground that close to me was awesome (the whole rush from going so fast was at least), but given the circumstances? Yeah, the whole "this is the awesomest thing I have ever done" feeling was drowned out by the feeling that I could still die. (When McKian gave me some coding to heal me, he practically turned me into a program. If I died on the Grid, I died for good.)

The light wall kept going and going. I wondered what powered the bikes. Energy, I hoped.

But wouldn't that mean that whoever was leaving the light wall would end up running out of energy? So many questions...

The lights got brighter. Glancing up, two helicopters, matching the cursed orange on the Recognizers, flew overhead.

"TARGET ENGAGED."

If the Recognizers didn't have guns, then the helicopters definitely did. I cringed, expecting the last thing I saw to be myself falling into billions of itty bitty pieces.

And then I realized-

they weren't firing at us.

Still trailing Mac, I looked up ahead. The rider with the light wall wasn't too far ahead; they were close enough for me to be able to tell it was a guy. His lights were very bright, the secondary circuits light blue, and the main ones white.

Wait a second...

He was an excellent driver, dodging every shot. His light wall was shot to bits, the little fragments of code hitting our bikes; I still couldn't believe he had that thing going.

More shots.

More lights.

The light wall reflected every single bit of light coming from the shots or the search lights. I couldn't see with the glare that bad and I felt my bike slam into something full tilt.

And then I felt myself landing on something.

"Good God, you don't need to get into another accident!"

I sighed in relief, the feeling of terror eating away at my stomach slightly decreasing.

Mac must've caught me as my bike rammed the light wall, derezzing and spraying little bits of black, purple and blue everywhere. I glanced back. All that remained were the little bits.

"Sorry, Mac," I yelled over the rumble of the machines over our heads.

"For what?" I felt the heat coming off Mac's circuits. I wrapped my arms around his back, hoping that I couldn't fall off easily; as if he'd read my mind, the see-through cover rose up and over us.

I sighed. "I, uh, I wrecked your bike," I shouted, glaring up at the stupid helicopters over us. Yeesh...

Finally, the rider, and us, lost the Occupation. We followed him without his shot-up light wall; turns out that the After that, McKian looked back over his shoulder. "There's more where that came from, Skigh. Just forget it. Besides, it needed some improvements. In fact," he stopped and scowled at a long, pixelated gash down the side of the bike. "I think mine does, too."

As Mac kept driving, I never saw where we were going. But that other rider...

The white "T" on his chest could've been seen a blasted mile away.

...

"Is it okay to be here? You never mentioned working here, or having any job."

Mac rolled his eyes. "Tell me who's going to hire this misfit."

"You're not a misfit, Mac." My turn to roll my eyes.

He had that tool again, that copy of an excellent tool. I knew Bodhi had made it. And I knew that Beck used it.

And I knew that the Renegade used it.

That thing worked on everything; bikes, cars, my Roadster in the "User" world (surprisingly- I didn't even want to know how that worked) and bombs.

I shuddered, remembering having to let that lunatic, that DIMWIT fall to his death. If I could've pulled him up, if he would've let me help...

"It's not my fault, it's not my fault, it's not my fault, it's not my fault," I mumbled, sprawling out on the floor, the cool tile beneath me a very dim white.

Mac looked up, a light green set of mechanic's gear covering his face and arms. "Did you say something, Skigh?"

"Wha- no." I pushed myself up. "How in the world did we even get in here?"

"The wonder watch."

I frowned. "The wonder what now?"

McKian laughed. "Matt called it the 'Wonder Watch.'"

"How much happened since I got hit?"

Mac sighed. "Not too much. Talked to Alan, to Alex, to Matt-"

"Back up." I cut him off. "Alex? You actually had a civilized conversation with Alex? My brother who hates you?!"

Mac nodded. "Quieter."

I nodded back. "How did that happen?"

"It was more like me just standing there and Alex ripping me apart." McKian glanced around. "This place is huge!"

I had to agree. The garage was huge. I guess I just expected, though I'd never met the guy in person, to see Able walking around.

This looked like a good place to work, but that judgement call may or may not have been off a little due to the fact that the dim lighting didn't do it justice.

Seen images on the computer of this place? You bet.

Did they do it justice?

Not. A. Chance.

Mac had started up one of the repair stations and had been taking his bike apart and putting it back together, the screen on his watch glowing blue. That thing looked the same here, the same silver bands and black middle band, the same green and blue lights on it. He looked up and smiled. "You look really nice in purple."

I smiled back, feeling the blood rush to my cheeks. "Uh..." Good God! Why couldn't I get the words out?! "Thanks." I took a deep breath and tried to relax.

McKian deactivated his gear. "Lesson one," he began, grabbing my hand and pulling me up so I could stand. "You can ride alongside a light wall. You can brush up against one, slightly. You can jump over one with a light cycle. But you never run into one!" He smirked. "I thought you knew that much."

"Gee, next time I'll remember that when I've been blinded."

Mac bit his lip and then had to cover his mouth to stop laughing. I did too, hoping that no one had heard us. You couldn't be derezzed for being here… could you?

Boy, I hoped not.

I noticed Mac was staring at me.

And frowning.

"Is something wrong?" I mumbled, suddenly feeling tired.

McKian gently grabbed my shoulder. I looked up into his eyes. Man, by now I should've known that was a bad idea. "You're tired."

I bit my lip, trying not to yawn. "No I'm not."

I felt Mac press his hand against my back and pull me against his chest. I looked up as he looked down at me. "Are you sure? It looked like you were going to yawn there." He smiled, his eyes glowing even more; I struggled to look away and break the contact that would eventually lead to me telling him how I really felt about him.

"Okay, fine. Tired," I admitted, wrapping my arms around him as well. I never really realized just how much he towered over me. He was at least ten inches taller, making me a midget in comparison.

I closed my eyes and sighed. I opened my eyes again as I felt McKian pick me up and cradle me in his arms. Felt even smaller. "Where we goin'?" I yawned.

"In here." Mac adjusted his hold and pressed his left hand, the one with the watch, against a control panel by a door. I closed my eyes again, the darkness of the garage and the black that I saw with my closed eyes matched. Something clicked.

And I fell asleep in Mac's arms.

…

I shivered, forcing my eyes open.

The room was still dark, and I felt a little cold.

But there was something warm up against me.

I turned my head and gasped.

McKian was holding me against him, trying to keep me warm. His green eyes kept up their continuous glow as they fluttered open. "Hi."

"Hi." We both sat up, leaning against the wall behind us. "Where are we in the garage?"

"We're-"

Mac stopped and rose to a kneeling position, motioning for me to stay down. From behind some kind of table, all I could see was light pouring in. Squinted and glanced fearfully at the light.

Someone was standing in the doorway.

"Yeah, I'll get it," the person said. A guy. This program sounded friendly enough.

But, well, not taking any chances.

The door shut behind him, clicking. I wished his echoing footsteps would vanish.

He needed to leave.

My eyes snapped shut, colored dots dancing in my blackened vision as the lights in the room came on.

Go. Away. NOW.

I felt Mac kneel beside me; his nervous breathing didn't make me feel any better.

This probably wouldn't end well...


	3. Chapter 2

(Skigh's POV)

"Oh, no…"

I rolled my eyes. Yeah, this was great. Let's see, we'd been chased by the Occupation and shot at, we'd somehow wound up in Able's garage (thank you, McKian) and now…

This just got better and better.

"Think he'll leave?" I whispered to McKian, who was trying to glance over the glowing white desk.

Mac slowly nodded as the door clicked twice. "He's gone."

"Thank God," I sighed with relief. "You see who it was?"

McKian shook his head. Cautiously, we both stood up. I looked around and felt my eyes get wide.

Able's office.

"Wow, this place is amazing!" I picked up a baton laying on the desk. "The Encom 786."

Mac leapt over the desk and looked around. "Able definitely knew how to collect stuff."

After exploring for a little while, I noticed Mac looking out the window behind Able's desk. More Recognizers flew past. I heard him mumble something, but I couldn't understand him.

"What?" I stepped next to him and looked out the window too. Argon did look beautiful, minus the whole brigade of machines overhead that looked like death warmed over.

"How are we getting out of here?"

Yeah, we needed to think that through more last night. It wasn't like walking out the front door was an option.

But the window might be.

…

"Okay, now where do we go?"

McKian laughed. "I thought you'd want to go back to your world after almost getting picked up after curfew."

"Ah, come on," I said, playfully punching his arm. "I've only been here long enough to wreck one light-bike." I froze. "Um, did you realize who was on that other bike last night?"

Mac motioned to turn past one of the clubs. "No. Why? Who was it?"

"Beck."

Now Mac froze. "That was Beck?!"

"Well, Renegade Beck."

"Wow, no wonder we were getting shot at." We turned again, this time into a club. "Well, at least there's no soldiers in here."

I glanced around as we walked to one of the tables; I needed some time to adjust to the changing colors of the lights. "Um, spoke too soon."

"What?" McKian, partly kneeling on the black seat by the table, frowned and followed my gaze over to the door. He glared.

The orange and red lights, the shorter brown hair, heels clicking off the floor…

"Paige," I muttered. "At least it's not Pavel."

We sat down, both on the same side of the table, me on the inside. Mac drummed his fingers on the tabletop before mumbling, "And CLU's in town."

"Wait, the almighty bozo's here?"

He nodded. "Yep."

I smirked. "Mac?"

"Yeah, Skigh?"

"Is there anything that we can do-"

Mac rolled his eyes. "I wouldn't recommend it. Not yet at least. And besides, you being a you-know-what and all isn't going to be your saving grace if we get caught."

"So we just put all the stress on Beck and Tron?"

"No, but when we do something, we have to be careful."

"Okay, I can do tha-" I smiled. "You said 'when.'"

Mac stopped drumming his fingers, a squeaking noise coming from his fingers running along the table. "Yeah, so?"

"So, WHEN are we doing something?"

McKian looked over his shoulder at Paige. She was still by the door."Hold up! We need something to do first!"

"Behead another statue?"

Mac chuckled and lounged in the seat. "No. That's already been done."

"The free code graffiti thing?"

"Again, it's been done."

"The data cube?"

Mac sat up straight, grinning. "That's a possibility."

"Well, gee, it looks like you consider it to be something more than a possibility."

"What would you say if I told you that I already had a plan?"

I laughed. "Mac, I could kill you for that!"

McKian scooted away. "You're not going to, are you?"

Over, hm… (October, November, December, January, February, March, April) seven months, McKian still had that paranoid side to him. "No, Mac, it's only a joke. Sorry if I scared you."

"It's fine. I guess I'm just on edge…" Mac looked up at Paige again. She was walking this way.

"Shoot…" I tried to kept my shaking hands and levels of nervousness down to a minimum. I wasn't scared of Paige; I was just worried that if someone found out that I was a User that Mac would get hurt.

Paige slowed down when she got near us. And then, God forbid she would have kept moving, she stopped and stared at us. Not glaring, but staring enough to make me uneasy. I figured that maybe it was time to love your enemies. I smiled at Paige and, with my hand close to the table, waved. The commander slightly smiled back, nodded, then started walking away again.

McKian twisted in the seat, his arm up around the back. "What did you just do?! She actually smiled!"

"Well, it just proves that there is a heart beneath that ice-cold, 'perfection is freedom' exterior." I sighed and leaned back, my head bumping something.

Mac's arm.

The seat moved slightly as McKian slid closer to me, his massive arm around my small shoulders. "You're gonna need some energy for later."

I nodded, not quite grasping what he meant. I closed my eyes for a couple minutes and opened them to see two glasses on the table. The glowing blue liquid inside them was a little intimidating; now I knew what he meant, and to me, it almost seemed like drinking the stuff inside a glow stick.

Why did everything have to glow here?

I watched as Mac picked up his glass and downed half of it. When he pulled the cup away from his pale-grey lips, he was smiling. (Oh, great… that smile might be the death of me!) "It's not gonna hurt you."

I wrapped my fingers around the glass and stared at it. "Stop glowing."

"I don't think it heard you," Mac's muffled voice came through his glass as he took another sip.

Now I knew how Mac felt when he first wound up in my house and Alan and I tried getting him to eat. But glowing stuff?

I slowly brought the cup to my lips and took a deep breath.

Never, in my life, did I ever expect to drink something that was glowing.

…

Why we were here?

Good Lord only knows why…

Mac had decided to ride through the outlands, that way I could get some more practice in on a light cycle.

"'Don't rely on your light wall. Learn to control me without it.'"

I rolled my eyes and shouted back, "Really, Mac? You're quoting Tron now?"

"Maybe." I faintly heard McKian's reply over the bikes. "'Dominate with momentum. Anticipate!'"

"SHUT UP!"

We both laughed and sped up, racing around the corners and avoiding slamming into the side of mountains.

Finally, Mac decided to call it quits. Still straddling the bikes, we looked out at the view of Argon. Everything looked so peaceful and calm, excluding Tesler's massive ship. "So, how long do we have to be here?"

"Probably a couple days. Then I have to get you back into the hospital."

Wait, what? "Why the hospital?" I asked, noticing that my voice shook. I hate hospitals. Always have; always will.

Mac shrugged. "Matt and I may or may not have tampered with the security camera in your room, switched you for a hologram of you and then brought you here…" he stopped and sighed. "If we wouldn't have, you'd probably be dead by now."

"How long have we been gone?"

Mac tapped his watch. "Only seven hours. We have a little over two weeks to get the real you back in that bed and have you make your miraculous recovery."

Brave plan.

Bold plan.

Insane, crazy, ridiculous plan.

And it had worked.

"Thank you," I managed to whisper, mainly because my voice was giving out. No crying this time, no sleeping; I could get through this.

I jumped as Mac patted my back. "It was Matt mostly."

"Okay, Mr. Modest. I know you did a lot of it."

The world could never find out about this, not the Grid- not the User world.

God, McKian, Matt and me were the only ones.

"Oh, um…"

"What?" What else did I need to know?

Mac bit his lip. "Alan helped out , too."

Oh, great. The plot thickens. "Seriously?"

Mac nodded. "We asked him to drive the doctors crazy long enough for us to make the switch."

Make that God, McKian, Matt, Alan and me were the only ones. "Does Alex know anything about you?"

"No, and I'd like to keep it that way."

I smiled at Mac. That little voice in my head was screaming for me to tell him how I felt.

But that little voice in my head and I both knew that wasn't happening.

Not now, at least.

I jumped as I suddenly noticed a blue streak heading towards us. Mac derezzed his bike, and so did I. We stood side by side as the streak got closer.

"You might need your disc," Mac muttered. "But I'm hoping that rider's who I think it is."

"How can you see that far-" I glanced at his blue glowing watch screen and rolled my eyes. Duh, the guy can practically turn himself into Superman.

The rider came closer and finally pulled up next to us. He derezzed his bike and stepped over to us. He seemed familiar, but that helmet wasn't helping.

And then it came off.

I kicked myself mentally, realizing that I should've known this guy, even without seeing his face.

McKian relaxed and grinned. "Hey, Beck."


	4. Chapter 3

(Mac's POV)

I hadn't seen Beck in a while.

And I certainly had not expected to see him here.

But in the middle of the outlands… yeah, I should've known he'd be out here.

Beck ran his hand through his spiky hair. "What are you doing out here?"

"I was about to ask you the same thing," I replied, smiling. "You do realize this is the middle of nowhere."

I bit my lip as Skigh struggled not to laugh.

"Oh, yeah…" Now I felt bad. Beck was actually trying to answer the question.

Shoot!

"I'm on an errand," Beck finally managed. He stared at Skigh. "Who's your friend?"

Time to get Beck to relax, if that was possible for the Renegade to do. "Beck, this is Skigh. Skigh, this is Beck." Hopefully Beck wasn't too on edge.

"Nice to meet you."

Skigh grinned. "Nice to meet you too." I started wondering what was going through her head, being this close to the Renegade and all.

Beck crossed his arms. "So, why are you two out here?"

"Just…" Great. Now I was the one struggling to answer.

"Just riding," Skigh answered quickly. I sighed with relief inwardly. Skigh always had an answer or an excuse for anything and everything, which, for my situation, worked out pretty well.

I noticed Beck staring at the watch. "That get you in trouble lately? I'm hoping you'll say no."

"Recent trouble? Then, no."

Beck shook his head. "McKian, come on. Any trouble?"

I sighed and hoped Skigh didn't notice me motioning for Beck not to ask any more questions about the watch. This thing was a blessing in one world, and it was a curse in the other.

And here, on the Grid, it was a curse.

Beck glanced at my hand and nodded. "Okay, well, nice meeting you, Skigh. I have to… go finish that errand."

I nodded. "See you around."

As Beck sped off on his lightcycle, Skigh smirked. "So, that was the Renegade?"

"Yes."

Skigh stared up at me. Until now, I never really realized that she was that short. "Do you know where he's going?" she asked.

"I can guess," I answered, watching as Beck completely disappeared.

* * *

We were back in one of the various caves in the outlands. I was working on the bike again, trying to improve it's handling capabilities. The turning radius had needed serious help.

I heard a noise. Thinking it was just something else wrong with the bike (after a couple rough landings, I needed to check it out), I just checked it again.

Everything was fine.

And then I heard the noise again.

I glanced over my shoulder, then stared. I was really stupid for not noticing.

Skigh was huddled in the far corner, her knees pulled up to her chest and her arms wrapped around her legs. She was shaking.

"Skigh?" I let go of the bike, letting it fall to the ground. She cringed and curled herself into an even smaller ball. "Skigh, are you alright?"

She didn't answer. The only thing she did was keep shaking.

I knelt beside her. "Are you okay?"

Skigh just stared off into space. Her brown eyes were wide open, and she looked terrified.

"SKIGH."

Skigh's eyes slowly closed, then reopened. She looked at me. "I saw him fall."

"What?" I thought I'd heard her right, but she was speaking too quiet to understand.

She threw her head in her hands. "I saw him fall. I saw Dimwit fall again."

I sighed. Ever since the building had blown up and Dimwit refused to let her pull him up, she kept having flashbacks. The guy had threatened to reveal the information he had on me not necessarily being "normal", and wound up falling to his death because of his stupidity. We'd tried to save him, but he was gone.

"It's okay, it's okay," I mumbled as I sat right up against her. I rubbed her back, hoping that she'd calm down. After everything she'd already been through…

Skigh shivered. "It's cold here."

And, the good Lord only knows how, I wound up with Skigh on my lap, her arms wrapped around my neck and my arms wrapped around her small, shaking body. Her skin felt cold. I slowly ran my hand through her hair, which usually got her to calm down a little.

And this time, thankfully, it worked.

Skigh slowly stopped shaking.

"Are you okay now?" I asked.

"Y-yeah."

I closed my eyes and slightly relaxed my hold. Skigh was still hugging me. I felt her move a little, but I didn't think anything of it.

Suddenly, I felt something warm on the side of my face. My cold cheek now felt warmer. And then, my head still spinning, I realized what that was as I opened my eyes.

Skigh had kissed me, just like I had kissed her forehead several times in the hospital. I never really expected her to do that, and certainly not now.

But I'm not saying it was a bad thing.

Skigh looked up into my eyes and we both smiled as we kept staring at each other. After a while, Skigh shattered the awkward silent with another hug and two very quiet words that made me start shaking.

"Thank you."

* * *

I laughed. "Skigh, what are you doing?"

Skigh kept playing with her hair, and she looked annoyed. "Do you guys have any dye here?" I heard sarcasm there…

"No, but I can recode the color of your hair."

"Okay, genius." Skigh laughed. "Sounds a lot easier than dying it and re-dying it."

"It is. Here, give me your disc."

As soon as I had her disc in my hands I froze. "Uh, Skigh? What happens when we get back and you're hair's a different color, and possibly a different length?"

Skigh frowned. "You can create holograms with that, right?"

I nodded. "Yeah."

"So, when we get back we'll just activate a hologram that turns my hair its normal color. Later on, we can switch it back."

I pulled up a rotating picture of Skigh. Glancing up from the glowing blue picture pouring from her disc, I realized that her hair was slowly changing from a light blonde color to a brownish-blonde. She must have dyed her hair a lot.

And then I started thinking, which usually means that I'm going to get myself into some sort of trouble. Her disc… I could probably understand her better if I saw her memories, like I had before. (Long story short: I accidentally used my watch- thing can be a curse- and saw all her memories. I remember hearing something about a User's mind being similar to a computer, so the whole incident now made a little more sense.) Maybe I could help her. Maybe if I-

No, I wasn't going to do it.

I'd already seen her memories, some of them. And though I'd forgotten a few (some I had to force myself to forget), Matt had already told me enough about Skigh. It wasn't worth purposely seeing them. And I didn't come right out and tell her about me and the trouble I got in. Those were her memories, and I didn't want her to not trust me anymore. And knowing me, I would be more harm than help.

"So," I neglected the thought. I knew enough to help her. "What color were you thinking?"

Skigh shrugged. "Anything but black, red or green."

I nodded. "But why no red?" Black was the only normal sounding color she'd said. Why no black?

"I tried it once, and, well, I… maybe red at some point, but not this time."

I grinned. "So, what color?"

"You choose."

"Wait, what?! You want me to choose? The misfit program who screws up everything is supposed to choose?"

Skigh smiled at me. "You don't screw stuff up, McKian." Okay, my full first name, not the nickname. I could feel the heat in my cheeks, and I was pretty sure I was blushing. I tried to smile back, and I was pretty sure that by now my very white face was dark red.

"O-okay…"

This was not, by any means, going to be easy.

…

I was starting to see spots by now.

My head ached. I had two ideas for Skigh, and I didn't know which one she'd like, if she even liked either.

I couldn't believe she had left a decision like this up to me. I couldn't believe it.

I was the program who could screw stuff up. I was the one who stuck out because of a stupid band around my arm. No one knew where I came from, or how I was created.

Even I didn't know.

Now, looking back on all this, I have a pretty decent theory.

"Just focus, just focus," I muttered, staring at the hologram of Skigh's head, the two different styles changing out constantly.

I felt my eyes start to close, and for a while, I fought to keep them open. But after a while, I was just too tired. I really hadn't gotten enough energy earlier. In fact, I gave half of my glass to Skigh.

I laid down on the cave floor, the colors from the hologram fading to black.

…

"Mac?"

I groaned and rolled on my side. I heard something, but I couldn't tell what it was, so I didn't care.

"McKian? Come on, you okay?"

I forced my eyes open. "What?"

"You passed out, I think."

I nodded, remembering that Skigh had been sleeping while I tried to pick something-

I gasped as I looked up at Skigh again. Her hair wasn't blond-brown anymore. It was purple that turned into pink, pink that turned into tan and tan into brown. She picked the first one.

And it looked pretty good.

"I see you picked one," I said, sitting up. "It looks nice."

Skigh blushed. "Thanks, but you picked it."

I shrugged, then noticed something else about her hair. "Skigh?"

"Yeah?"

I tried not to laugh as I asked the question, afraid of the answer. "How did you cut your hair?"

Her hair looked nice long, but it looked a lot better sort. She'd hacked it, her hair now above her shoulders. Skigh's bangs were shorter, too.

Skigh laughed. "I used my disc."

"You what?!" I started laughing. Yes she could've killed herself trying to do this, but apparently she hadn't.

"Well, I don't see any scissors around here, so I just hacked it off. It's too long."

We laughed more. But I was still nervous. "You realize that I could have just recoded it to make it shorter."

"Aww, you really wanna take all the fun out of it?"

"Fun?" I rolled my eyes and stood up, towering over Skigh. "One wrong move, and you could've removed your head."

Skigh pointed at me. "But I didn't. And I have no intention of dying anytime soon."

I smiled. "Just don't cut your hair with your disc again and you should be fine."

I gasped as Skigh hugged me, her arms wrapped around me. I wanted to tell her how I felt so bad…

But as I wrapped my arms around her, I knew that I'd probably screw that up too.

Maybe when we got back I could ask Matt for some help. Knowing him, he'd probably pull out some movie or television show and think that would be enough education.

Maybe right now I could give it a shot. Skigh always seemed to understand if I messed up. "Skigh," I tried to get my emotions under control, but something just didn't feel right. "I-"

Footsteps. I twisted away from Skigh and gasped, then glared. I glanced back at Skigh, and she was glaring too.

Three recognizers had landed outside the cave, blocking off any escape route. Four soldiers had entered the cave, their orange lights making me sick.

One of them stepped closer to us and drew his disc. "Surrender."

I frowned. It wasn't past curfew yet- and I was pretty sure you couldn't be arrested for just being in the outlands. Maybe they were scouting or something? What was going on?

The orange outer rim on his disc lit up, a ringing sound filling the air as he came closer. Only a few steps away, I drew my disc and so did Skigh.

Two more soldiers came closer, six sets of orange lights in total.

This didn't look good.

* * *

_Thanks for the reviews, guys! :)_


	5. Chapter 4

(Skigh's POV)

"Surrender."

This was the second time this guard had said that. And if he hadn't noticed, we weren't surrendering.

Not yet at least.

"Get down!"

I heard Mac yell as he shoved me to the floor. He landed beside me and threw his disc, the blazing light blue edge barely missing a soldier's arm.

Glancing back, I saw an orange and black disc embedded in the back of the cave wall. I started pushing myself up from the cave floor, then dropped back down as another disc narrowly missed my head.

Not good.

I jumped up, no clue really how to use a disc, and punched the one guard in the stomach as he tried to bury his disc in my shoulder. The clattering of his disc as it hit the ground echoed in my ears; he grunted as my fist connected with his abdomen, fell, then groaned as his helmeted head bounced off the floor.

I kept throwing glances at McKian. He'd done various maneuvers that, with the injuries I'd had in the past, I could never attempt. Mac kicked off the side of the cave, did a decent backflip and, before landing, managed to kick a guard in the face. Part of his helmet shattered and the guard fell back, cradling his head in his hands.

"Oh, this just gets better and better," I muttered as two more headed my direction. I dodged a couple kicks, then blocked a couple punches. I twisted around, something in my leg popping as I kicked a disc from the one guard's hand. As he bent down to retrieve it, I kicked him again, sending him flying across the floor.

The second guard growled. That sound was really annoying! The next couple seconds were a blur, but the guard ended up falling on top of the other one, all sprawled out.

I had lost track of McKian and his progress; a flash of blue light now and then in my peripheral vision assured me that Mac was still fighting.

But it also was a bit of a distraction.

Something slammed into me. I gritted my teeth as my head banged off the hard ground. The growling sound, now slightly distorted, was much louder. The spots in my vision slowly faded, and then I wished they were back.

Two guards were holding me down. It seemed like they were just multiplying every second. One was kneeling on my arms; the other was behind my head, a whirling orange and black blur of heat by my throat.

The guard holding my down jabbed his knee into my stomach. I screamed. This felt way too familiar. I could feel the flashbacks from my past weaving themselves into the pain filling my body. Little bits and pieces of shattered memories started racing through my mind, making thinking an impossible option.

Everything started to become a big blur, both sound and vision. I tried to kick one of the guards, but that failed. Over the roaring in my ears, I managed to hear the guard above me.

"Stand down or be derezzed."

I would have laughed if I was able to breathe. These guys obviously needed some mental help.

No, more like CLU needed that kind of help. The person who wound up being lucky enough to pick apart his brain (or disc, or whatever- hey, not able to breathe or think straight here!) would probably end up going insane from trying to figure out how to fix him.

The guard threw his disc, hitting one of the other soldiers. The blurry form of a derezzing guard wasn't making me feel like this was going to get any better; the feeling only increased as the guard wrapped his hands around my throat.

As I started to lose feeling, and everything started twisting into black, I saw something, or someone pulling the guard off of me. Their white suit and bright white lights faded into darkness with everything else, and his identity started ringing in my ears as I passed out.

Beck.

...

Muffled voices.

Weird, distorted, muffled voices.

There were two of them, and everything they said was indecipherable.

I still hurt. It still felt like someone was squeezing my throat; I was having trouble getting a decent breath.

I tried opening my eyes, but they stayed shut. And the blackness I saw only acted as a projector, replaying broken bits of memories that I wished I could forget millions of times.

That blasted pocketknife was haunting me again. I felt the scars on my upper left arm, hands, neck and several on my back and various other places ignite; they were on fire again.

I tried moving, but that was just about impossible. Maybe I was moving. Maybe I wasn't. The only feeling I had was where I'd been injured in the past.

Suddenly the voices above me were clear.

"Why were you two out here?"

I winced as the grating edge the mask added to the Renegade's voice echoed, causing my head to hurt even more.

I heard McKian answer, but his voice echoed too much for me to be able to understand what he'd said. Probably a lie.

I forced my eyes open, unable to stand the pitch black any longer. The pain started to fade, but my vision was all blurry blobs.

"Skigh?" I vaguely heard Mac's voice, feeling the ground beneath me shake as he jumped down to the floor. As my vision cleared a little bit more, I saw that he was kneeling by me. "Are you alright?"

I nodded and sat up, the pain gone. My vision was fine by now. Maybe I was just trying to get back the air I'd lost when that guard decided to choke me. "How long was I out?" I asked quietly.

"Not too long." I frowned and stared at McKian. His tone… something wasn't right.

I looked up past him. Beck looked like he really towered over me from my spot on the ground; the Tron suit probably made him look taller, more powerful. I almost laughed as I remembered saying a while ago, back in the User world, that Beck looked better in the suit than Tron did.

"Are you sure you're alright?" Beck asked.

I nodded. Good God, I wished that he could just take that stinking mask off. It was probably annoying, having to wear that blasted thing all the time.

Mac gently pushed me back down. "You rest. Knowing how we get into trouble, you'll need it."

I smirked. I rolled my closed eyes as Renegade Beck asked, "What does that mean?"

* * *

"I. Can't. Believe. We're. In. Here."

Mac spun around and grinned. "This looks so much like your old place."

"You mean my brother's place," I admitted sadly. Everything was almost identical; the stairway, the elevator, the layout-

Tron's hideout shocked me. At the old house (more like a house inside a mountain- talk about an enigma), everything resembled the lair. Mac had been testing how the systems in here worked, and he was amazed at how much access Tron had to the Grid.

"Remind me how we actually got in here?" I started wondering where Tron was. We really shouldn't have been able to get in here.

Mac shrugged and pressed his pale hands against one of the massive windows. I smirked as he shoved his face against the glass. "This view is amazing!"

I stepped beside him and gaped at the view; the various mountains and caverns and every twist and turn of the outlands were visible, as well as the beautiful lights of Argon. "Wish the view was this good back, well, you know where I mean," I slurred the last half.

McKian snickered. I looked over at him as his body shook with laughter. "Yeah, you mean in the auditorium."

"Shut up." I started to smile, then stopped. Something wasn't right. True, we weren't supposed to be here, but it was just something else that seemed off. "Maybe we should get going, you know, so we don't run into Tron?"

"That sounds good," Mac mumbled as he backed away from the window. His already chalk-white skin paled.

Something was definitely off here.

…

"Who is that?"

I glanced back over my shoulder for the millionth time. We were being followed, ever since we left Tron's hideout; the rider stayed pretty far back, and that only made my bad feeling about them worse.

(Mac and I both get these weird feelings when something important, or bad, is about to happen. And the majority of the time, something does happen.)

So, yeah, back to the feeling that made my stomach turn and made me hope that I didn't wind up dead.

I watched as McKian motioned for me to hit the brakes. Swallowing the lump of nervousness lodged in my throat, I slammed to a stop, the bike drifting; the purple lights of mine trailed Mac's green ones as we skidded to a stop.

As the rider got closer, I tensed, every second stretching out into millennia as Mac tapped the screen on his watch. It flashed blue, and for a moment I was distracted, wondering if after he tapped the screen he had some mental link with the watch. Probably, I mean the thing was linked into his nervous system and it changed his talents or abilities and-

I snapped back to the present as the rider drifted to a stop, the white lights on his bike glaring and harsh. The motherload of white circuits spilling off from his suit and onto his face and hands-

Crud.

I glared at this program, remembering him immediately. My temper isn't really there, unless you've done something to someone I care about; and I don't believe in holding grudges.

But this program… the things he'd done, or almost done, were enough to make my blood boil and my head explode.

We'd already had enough trouble, and now we'd ran into Cyrus.

Yay...


	6. Chapter 5

(Skigh's POV)

I don't believe in killing others.

I don't believe in getting my revenge on people who've hurt me. (And believe me, many have.)

I wouldn't kill Cyrus, and I was pretty sure Mac wasn't about to, either. Our beliefs were practically the same; don't hold grudges, forgive and forget (or try with every blasted fiber of your being in my case), don't hate others (hey, the Bible says to love your enemies, and I try to do that- I'm nowhere close to perfect), and help others who need it.

Cyrus?

Cyrus was a crazy lunatic who really needed to be locked away again. But it seemed like no prison could contain his insanity.

It… it also seemed like he'd seen McKian before as he smirked and tipped his head to the side, arms folding across his chest. "I know you…" Cyrus let his twisted voice trail off.

Mac smirked. "Yeah, your first impression stunk. Can't wait for your second one."

"Wait a second, you two know each other?" This was confusing.

"Sadly," McKian muttered; I glanced down at his wrist as his fingers tapped the screen without him looking at the watch.

Cyrus laughed. "As I recall, you were the one who tackled me."

"And as I recall, you nearly destroyed the Grid," McKian spat back. I realized that we had another thing in common; our tempers only flare when friends or people we care about get drawn into stupid things.

Cyrus's smug expression vanished, then returned as quickly as it disappeared. "I don't know what you're talking ab-"

"Shut up! You know exactly what we're talking about, you liar!" I snapped, keeping my emotions in check. I wasn't snapping out of anger; I just wanted to unnerve him.

And it worked.

Cyrus glared, the white lines on his face distorting as he spoke again. "What did you call me?"

"A liar."

I clenched my fists as Cyrus stepped closer.

McKian stepped closer to him as well, the two of them only about a foot away from each other. "I can't believe someone with so much potential turned into someone so insane."

Cyrus's dark eyes narrowed, the tiny slits emanating hatred and anger. "I am NOT insane!"

I slowly stepped up beside McKian. Really, I wanted to step back; I wanted to step back away from the program who had killed innocent programs, and since Able was one of them, I was past the point of being ticked off.

"And just HOW do you know about that? About FREEING the Grid?!" Cyrus kept screaming. "Beck- Beck must have told you! He must have lied to you! My plan would have worked! And he RUINED it- ruined EVERYTHING!" At this point, he was just babbling. And it was getting old.

Fast.

Suddenly, Cyrus stopped his endless string of jumbled, and insane, lies. He drew his disc and lashed out with it at McKian, the blaring white edge narrowly missing Mac's chest. I jumped away from him as Mac flipped himself over Cyrus's head; I never knew he could do that, let alone the other stunts and moves.

I felt stupid. Man, I felt like such a stinking idiot, kneeling on the ground, avoiding getting my self involved. Mac was doing fine on his own, already having landed more than a dozen solid punches- most of them to Cyrus's abdomen. But seriously, with my mile long list of injuries from, well, people who didn't necessarily care too much for me, I wasn't able to fight very well or do much of anything athletic without pain.

But after a few minutes or so (I'm a little rusty when it comes to time on the Grid), I had to help Mac out. Cyrus had him pinned down, and that was after kicking him in the gut a few times.

"Y-You're c-cr-crazy, Cyrus," Mac gasped as Cyrus shoved his knee into his chest.

I ran over, feeling one of my newer injuries from the recent collision of my body with a Cadillac start burning, and tackled Cyrus, sending the both of us flying. I cringed as my head slammed off the hard ground, but at least I'd gotten him off McKian.

My head hit the ground again as Cyrus pinned me down; just about every program was bigger than me, and right now it was really annoying!

"I've beaten your little friend," Cyrus hissed in my ear. His voice sounded so familiar…

I gritted my teeth and twisted my legs out from underneath his, reached up and plastered the bottom of my foot to his face. I grinned as Cyrus's hold decimated and he fell onto his side.

As I stood up, I froze.

Dimwit…

I glanced back at McKian. "That flash drive… he was on it, wasn't he?!"

Mac, sitting up and catching his breath, slowly nodded. "Yeah, but I thought he was still in it! I-" he sighed. "I failed again."

Where had that come from? Mac didn't know Cyrus would escape from a flash drive. he didn't know that-

Twisting around, I ducked as Cyrus growled and flew at me. He ended up falling to the ground, rolling over several times before pushing himself up. Stood up. Glared.

I glared at him again.. then glanced over my shoulder to make sure McKian was alright. Mac was pushing himself up, ready to stand. He smiled at me, then his eyes widened. "Skigh, get down!"

Never had a reason to question Mac before. I fell to the ground, feeling something fly past me. I looked up.

Cyrus's disc would've sliced me in two.

And now Mac had Cyrus's disc, and his, and he was rushing at Cyrus.

I stood up, but stayed back. Mac fighting Cyrus…

did not see that coming.

Finally, I got sick of it. Mac was going to wear himself out. I grabbed my disc, activated it, and threw the blasted thing.

Cyrus ducked, but the disc still sliced into his arm. The glittering pixels under the suit weren't a straight color; they were a mix of dull blue and very faint orange. And it made me want to puke.

But at least he started running, and thankfully, not in the direction of Argon, or Tron's lair. But I had the feeling we'd probably be seeing him again...

As my disc returned to my hand, I figured that Beck and Tron didn't need a visit from him any time soon. I wouldn't kill him (yeah, yeah, yeah, I went through that earlier- I don't kill people, or programs), but I threw the disc and watched as the disc dug into his leg. He screamed, then kept running, his baton laying on the ground; at some point, Mac had sliced the baton in half.

Mac smirked, then winced. I noted that he was holding his wrist. "What's wrong?"

McKian sighed and uncovered his wrist. "It still works, but…" he sighed again, staring at his left arm and the watch that now had a small crack.

"But? Mac, are you sure you're alright?"

Mac sighed a third time. "I think I am. But the watch isn't." He looked away from me. "His disc hit the watch. Everything still functions fine, and the damage hasn't affected me. But one addition was disabled. We… we can't get back to the User world."

No… "McKian, can you fix it?"

He looked back up at me, his eyes blazing with determination. "I can try, but I don't know if I can."


	7. Chapter 6

(Skigh's POV)

We had eight days to get me back to the hospital.

Mac had tried everything possible to get the watch back to normal. But at this point, our only hope was praying for a miracle.

But right now, we were working on something a little different.

And we had a good chance of getting ourselves killed in the process.

…

"How come it's so stinking easy to get in here, but not out?"

Mac laughed, softly, motioning for us to be quieter. "They only see you after you get in." He pressed himself against a wall, as did I, as General Tesler walked past us. He looked, well, not too thrilled; he looked kinda like the pouty baby he was on occasion.

I glanced around. The orange lights looked ominous; the overwhelming feeling of evil and hatred in here was, for lack of a better word, overwhelming.

Tesler's ship. Or as Tron had called it a while back, "An impenetrable fortress of death." That's what the blasted thing looked like, and that's what the blasted thing was.

Yay for us, considering we were right in the middle of it.

"I hate it in here," I muttered, peeling myself from the wall as Tesler vanished. "It's too dark." And me saying that I hate the dark is a massive understatement.

The dim lighting illuminated enough of Mac's face to allow me to see he was smirking. "Well, then, let's lighten things up, shall we?"

I smirked back as he revealed the same tool from the exploding REVOLUTION building (the building where I used to work blew up because someone had "information" on Mac's secrets- him being a program, not really a "human"- and decided to blow the building sky high. No one was injured, except for me. Mac had used a copy of Bodhi's tool, the one our good buddy Beck carted around).

"There's more to the uprising," Mac said and I noticed a certain twinge of sarcasm creeping into his voice, "than acts of vandalism. You know that."

I rolled my eyes.

"Well, you do now."

We both laughed and started crawling through the tubes and crawlspaces inside Tesler's ship. "I wonder how Matt's doing," I thought out loud , wishing I'd kept the thought inside my head.

McKian kicked out one of the panels, crawled through, then pulled me out of the tubes. Thankfully, I wasn't claustrophobic. "Well, Alan's with him at the hospital, and they're keeping tabs on a hologram."

"Oh, then he'll be fine, I gue-"

"And Alex is there too."

"No probl- wait, what was that?!" Alex, Alan and Matt… that combination did not sound too good in my mind.

Mac glanced around. I followed his green eyes; they were glowing even more in here because of how dark it was. "Yeah, Alex, Alan and Matt are all at the hospital.

"Alex doesn't know that I'm not really there… does he?" I looked around at all the inner workings of the ship, all the wires, panels, control panels- lots of stuff to work with. Perfect.

I could only see the outline of his head and his glowing eyes as he shook his head. He laughed. "Okay," he began as he wrapped his fingers under the edges of a large panel, "here's the panel we need to-" he hadn't even done much of anything and the black panel fell off the wall and into his hands, "remove."

The ripped off panel exposed all the wires and circuits that were a critical part of the ship functioning.

Nice.

Mac unwound a few of the wires and yanked on them, giving him more wires to work with. He tapped his watch and the cracked screen lit up the usual bright blue. "Showtime."

I smirked as he connected the wires with his watch screen. Bright lights of every color, excluding orange, raced up the wires. "Are you sure this'll work?"

"Gee, the doubtfulness is strong with this one." Mac pulled the wires from his watch and smiled as the lights crept up the wires further and disappeared under the other panels.

"Someone's seen some Star Wars."

McKian laughed. "Matt's idea, not mine. The force doesn't actually exist… does it?"

"No. It's be pretty creepy if I could just reach out and strangle you," I commented. "And besides, it would only complicate life more."

Mac grinned as the darkness vanished, the whole room lighting up. "Okay, let's get going. We've still got a lot to do."

…

"What is THIS?!"

I started laughing, and so did Mac. We were up in a crawl space right above Tesler's orange command chair. Mac, still grinning and breathing heavily, motioned to be quiet as guards rushed onto the bridge.

We may or may not have reconfigured the ship's settings and functions so that whenever a command was issued or any system activated, colorful streams of code spilled out over the ship; and we may or may not have programmed the code to form the words "Tron Lives."

This was fun to watch.

Pavel, in all his bumbling, imperfect, stupidity, started poking at the colored code. I activated my helmet and mask to muffle my laughter as the code wrapped more of itself around his finger and stretched up his hand. He started screaming.

Mac, still without his helmet, smirked as Paige stepped onto the bridge; we could both tell she was trying not to laugh at Pavel as more of the code inched up his arm, then his neck, and covered the longer part of his dopey hair. If you couldn't tell by now, I don't care for Pavel. At all. The guy was a lying, scheming, idiotic (I don't call people idiots), crazy, insane, nut case, and the list just goes on.

"Paige! Do you know anything about this… this-"

Paige brush her long hair out of her face and assured General Tesler with, "I have no idea, Sir." As soon as Tesler turned around, she smirked at Pavel.

I shot a thumbs-up at McKian.

Mac's face vanished behind his dark mask as he uncurled his fingers to reveal a smoke bomb. He twisted his fingers along the one circle, the blue inner ring lighting up. I slowly, silently, opened the vent that led to the bridge of Tesler's ship and took the bomb from him. I let it fall to the ground, and in the chaos, no one noticed.

I closed the grate and started crawling along behind McKian. Seconds later, we heard muffled shouting from below us.

Now that Tesler and his bunch of minions and lackeys were distracted, it was time to get out of here. There was no such thing as a quiet exit from Tesler's ship.

…

"If we get caught, CLU is gonna kill us."

Mac shrugged. "Ah, come on. That life-sucking, propaganda-spreading, stone cold lunatic wouldn't even dream of it."

I smiled. "Are you always this funny?" Man, I just needed to tell him how I felt; if I kept it inside any longer, I was sure my head would explode.

Mac sighed, a sad smile beginning to appear on his face. "I wish… I normally only tell jokes around you."

I stopped breathing for a second. Yeah, those last two words had been quieter than the rest, but I'd heard them. "R-really?" I hoped Mac hadn't noticed that I'd struggled to begin the word.

"Yeah." McKian smirked. "And now, let's have some fun with this."

Mac threw another bomb, this one a little bigger.

And a little different.

We heard the bomb explode, but didn't see it until the smoke blanketed the buildings. And slowly, through the smoke, blue and white lights appeared, racing over the various beautiful buildings. "Tron Lives" was plastered on every building around us.

Another distraction.

We started running, trying to make sure no one had-

"Halt, programs! You are in violation of-"

Seen us.

Tuned them out. That was the only thing worth doing right now.

Mac started running, avoiding the guards pursuing us at every turn. I wasn't used to running like this for this long; and usually I couldn't. But since we'd just vandalized Tesler's ship and about half of Argon- and we hadn't even gotten to the good part yet.

McKian glared at the guards slowly falling behind. One, desperate, threw his disc. I ducked, wincing as I hit the ground. "We gotta stall them," I barely heard him say with his mask on, his voice so distorted.

I smirked. "Give me your baton. And a bomb."

As we kept running, the guards starting to get closer, I started the countdown on the bomb, stuck the beeping device to one end of the baton, twisted it apart so it would begin to rezz up, and I heaved it over my shoulder before it started to take form.

I fell again- we both did from the shock- as the light cycle exploded. We got up and kept running.

And running.

Finally, after running for forever, we lost them. I collapsed against a wall, my helmet retracting as I tried to catch my breath. I tried to smile up at Mac as he stood over me, his frowning face showing overwhelming concern. "Are you alright?"

I managed to nod, my mouth hanging open as I slowly refilled my lungs with air. "Now, where are we supposed to be going?"

"The docks," McKian answered before continuing with, "but I think we should use our bikes to get there. You sure you're okay? We were running for a while there."

I straightened up, looking up at McKian. "Mac, I'm fine." I coughed, realizing I'd overdone it.

Mac crossed his arms, his mask sliding away.

"I'll be fine," I corrected myself. "Now, let's get to the docks."

...

"If we get caught..." I stopped talking and chuckled, or laughed, or something like that; the helmet really reconfigured my voice.

"We won't, I promise." McKian tapped the cracked screen of his watch, blue lines crawling out of the glowing screen. He smirked and I watched in awe as the lines swirled around, little black tiles beginning to appear and twist around the blue lines. The tiles stretched out, covering the blue lines and creating a bomb; and this bomb happened to be huge, a long cylinder with two glowing spheres on the ends. Little white and blue wires stretched between two poles on the top of the cylinder. "This is mine," Mac said, smiling as he tapped his watch again and more blue lines appeared, and then more tiles, and then the second object rested on the floor next to the bomb. "And this is yours."

I picked up the smaller object and glanced around nervously. We were out in the open at the docks. I cradled the small object in my hand; a tiny black box with white and red lights. A small red button glowed on the top of the box. "Let's go."

Ever since the almighty dirtbag CLU's arrival, several Recognizers had been landing at the docks; McKian's little wonder-watch never missed a blessed thing. There was some sort of device being built here, and with the amount of Recognizers we'd seen fly in here, it must have been huge.

We didn't want to blow up the whole operation and kill the programs (yeah, they were guards, but they're still programs). So we wanted to distract them enough to blow up whatever they were building and let them survive.

After sneaking behind (and over, and around, and sometimes between) the crates stacked at the docks, we were standing on top of the crates that surrounded the Recognizers and horde of soldiers.

And Dyson.

"Man, this guy's everywhere," I muttered. I almost started laughing as I remembered how Matt had called him a vacuum cleaner when we told him what his name was. His orange circuits glared; I didn't like this guy, at all.

"I know." Mac knelt down, sitting the back-breaking bomb down. "This isn't gonna be easy."

I rolled my eyes under my mask. "So we outrun the guards after curfew, run into Cyrus, get chased by guards for God knows how long a second time, and NOW you're saying that it isn't 'gonna be easy?'"

"Okay, it never was easy." Mac drummed his fingers against the crate beneath him. "This isn't gonna be easy at all."

…

"Whatever that thing was, we blew it to Kingdom come! Nice!"

I smirked behind my mask as the whole area finally broke apart into little pixels that sprayed over our heads. The guards were fine.

This thing they were building?

Nope.

"Well, there's one less of whatever that was on the Grid." Mac slowly pushed himself up from the crate and stood up beside me. "That was-"

I held up my hand, motioning for him to stop talking. Something was beeping.

Something very close.

I turned around and noticed McKian glancing over his shoulder at the program behind us; minimal circuits, black suit with orange lights.

Not good.

Mac shoved a baton into my hand. "I think we should be going now."

"I'm not gonna argue," I hoarsely replied, watching as the program stepped closer.

Time to get out of here.

* * *

_Thanks for all the reviews, guys :)_


	8. Chapter 7

(Skigh's POV)

"Is he still back there?"

Mac glanced over his shoulder, then turned around just as an orange disc nearly sliced into his back. "I'm gonna go with yes, yes he is."

I looked over my shoulder, watching as his orange light cycle got closer to ours. He should've been up with us by now; he was obviously holding back.

"Mac!"

McKian looked over. "What?"

"Hit the brakes!"

"Have you lost your mind?!" Mac shouted back. He shook his head.

I sighed. "Mac, trust me!"

The second we hit the brakes, the other rider came flying up, swerving to avoid us. His bike twisted, slamming into the ground and he was thrown across the empty street; I winced as a loud smacking sound echoed from when his motionless body hit a building.

Great…

We rushed over to him, rolling him onto his stomach. Mac frowned. "Um, shouldn't he be face up?"

I grabbed his disc. "Okay, now he can be face up."

As I held the disc, the outer rim activated. Dropped it and watched as it changed from orange and black to white.

"Uh, Skigh, did we just-"

I nodded nervously. "I think we might have."

Mac picked up the Renegade's disc and turned him on his side to put the disc back. "Great, now I've knocked out Beck."

"Mac?"

"Yeah?"

I rolled my eyes and growled, "Shut up! We're out past curfew and if anyone hears you say his name, we're all dead. And I don't know about you, but I don't feel like getting derezzed!"

"Sorry," Mac mumbled. "I just screw-"

"Finish that sentence and you might be missing an arm." He always said that he screwed everything up. I was going to get him to quit that, even if it killed me. "So, what do we do with him?"

As soon as I finished the question, Beck sat up, his mask still on. He looked at me, then Mac, then stood. "What-"

"Are you okay?" I asked, cutting him off.

He nodded, then swayed a little. Nice one; we might have just injured the Renegade.

Beck stared at both of us again, all of us masked. "Are you sure?" Mac asked. I bit my lip as he added, "You might want to see if your bike can be upgraded. The turning radius on that thing's not too good."

His head shot up. "Um… yeah, I'll have it looked at. Thanks for you concern."

I watched as he rezzed up his bike again and sped off. Mac and I took off our masks and I laughed. "Really, Mac? Get the turning radius fixed?"

"What?"

"He's a mechanic! I'm sure he knows that his bike's shot!"

McKian shrugged. "Well, he doesn't know that we know who he is."

"That's true. I just hope he's alright."

* * *

ISOs.

This was gonna be fun.

I tapped the little light up buttons projecting from my disc which lay on the cave floor and smirked. I was going to figure out how the ISOs came to exist if it killed me. And knowing my track record, I had a good chance of dying in the process.

With Mac gone (he'd said something about clearing his head or something), I could easily figure this out.

Or at least I hoped I could.

And so (to spare you from hearing about hours of sitting there and being ready to pull my hair out) I finally found what I was looking for.

The ISOs were not created by the Grid, which was exactly what I was expecting. Someone had created them; there were commands in place.

But who?

It was either CLU or Flynn, and dear God, I was hoping that it was a code that Flynn had overlooked. If CLU had created them to just kill them off…

So this was was definitely fun. And after that, I was pretty sure my head was closer to exploding into millions of itty bitty bits than ever before.

…

"Dmm- I DIDN'T DO IT!" I jumped up, shaking.

Footsteps.

Footsteps had woken me up from another nightmare. And if the footsteps were from a guard, then I would have just woken up in another stupid nightmare; having them, so many of them, probably had taken years off my life.

I was relieved as my vision cleared to reveal blue and green circuits.

McKian.

Mac smiled, his eyes filled with worry and… something mischievous. "You okay? Another nightmare?"

I just nodded and yawned. "I hate them," I muttered, forcing back another yawn as I stood up. I noticed Mac's hands were behind his back. "What's behind your back?"

"Behind my back?" Mac smirked, struggling not to smile. He was definitely hiding something. "Nothing! Nothing's behind my back. Yep, absolutely nothing back there!"

I shrugged, feeling a smirk beginning to tug at my lips. "Mac, if you think I'm buying that, then there's nothing up here," I joked, tapping his forehead.

"Okay, okay, I have something for you."

Something for me? What in the world could he possibly have? "What is it?"

"I think you'll like it," McKian said. I could tell he was nervous. He bought his hands out from behind his back.

I stared in awe, smiling. What McKian had in his hands was nothing to be nervous over; in fact, it was the cutest thing ever!

A little black bunny sat in his hands, light blue lights covering his two front paws and part of his back; another shade of blue flowed alongside the light blue. It's little black ears were blue on the inside, and it's tiny blue eyes and whiskers glowed. "It's amazing! How did you-"

"So you really like him?" Mac interrupted. "I wasn't sure if you would."

"Why wouldn't I? He's so cute!" I gently rubbed the velvet fur on the top of his head, surprised that the rabbit's fur could be this short. He was definitely a dwarf rabbit, probably about three pounds at most.

Mac grinned. "You want to hold him?"

The bunny squirmed a little, but he was very calm. "How can you tell that it's a boy?"

I laughed as Mac looked away. "Um… no comment."

Licking my fingers. He was licking my fingers, and his teeny tiny ears were lopsided, one sticking up normally, the other hanging down. I stroked his extra-short fur and felt my smile get bigger. I had always been allergic to an animals with fur, but this little guy…

"I made sure he's hypoallergenic," Mac informed me, like he'd read my mind. "And we can take him back to the User world, when we get back that is."

I sighed and pressed the little fluffy ball to my chest. "I hope we can get back."

"We will get back. I know we will."

I grinned. Optimistic… another thing the two of us had in common. "So, does this little cutie have a name?"

"No, but he needs one."

I bit my lip, still stuck on my earlier question of how this squirming ball of cuteness was a boy. "Hmm… I think you should name him."

"Me?" McKian wave his hands around. He was still so scared around me or Matt (at the moment, just me) that he'd do something wrong and offend us. "I-I can't name him, Sk-"

I didn't let him finish my name. "Please, Mac? I really want you to name him." The little squirmy thing twisted in my hands and started licking me again.

Mac shuffled his feet. "Jump Drive."

Rubbing between his fuzzy ears, I looked up from the bunny's glowing blue eyes to Mac's glowing green ones. "J.D."

Mac nodded and stepped closer. He rubbed J.D's back with his massive fingertips. "Is that name alright?"

I smiled up at him. "It's perfect. Hello, little J.D."

* * *

_- WhootOwlAlto on Twitter named Jump Drive, and my friends decided what colors he should be. (Thanks, guys!) :)_


	9. Chapter 8

(Mac's POV)

We had less than two days left.

And we still had no way back.

If we didn't get back to the User world, everything would be exposed. My secret, the hologram, probably Dimwit-

everything.

But there was no way to fix my watch.

And so there was no way back.

* * *

"Hey, Beck!"

Skigh was back at the cave, playing with Jump Drive. I don't know why she wanted me to name the bunny. And I didn't know why I was so nervous to.

And, for some reason, I was still shaky as I met Beck at Argon Park. And then I saw why.

Zed and Mara were there too, already in the middle of a disc battle. And now I knew why I was scared.

Beck grinned. "Hi, McKian!" He looked around. "Where's your friend?"

"At… work," I quickly lied, hoping that it was convincing enough.

I winced as a program walking behind me punched me in the back. "Friend? Yeah, right. Like the misfit has any friends."

Beck glared at them. "Excuse me?"

I tried not to stare at the soldiers walking, and considering that Paige was one of them. "Uh, Beck?"

"What? That guy's a jerk!"

"Um, look behind you."

Beck twisted around, and I saw his eyes widen. "And Paige is coming over here. Just what I need," he muttered.

Great, something else was my fault. "Sorry, Beck." I sighed. I never did anything right.

Zed and Mara just stood there, stopping their game. And now everyone was staring.

Things never went well. I was just glad Skigh wasn't here.

"What's going on over here?" I bit my lip as Paige started asking questions, the guards surrounding the park.

The program who punched me laughed. "Oh, nothing out of the ordinary. The misfit just decided to start a fight."

Beck rolled his eyes. "That's not what happened! You punched him!" And now Beck was involved… yay.

Paige sighed. "Okay, who did what?! And I want the truth this time!"

I couldn't say anything. If I did, I would be considered a liar. I was already considered to be a number of things.

Beck started to speak, but his glare in his eyes turned into surprise as the one statue in the park was covered in graffiti, several miniature bombs exploding around the base of it and more glowing, colorful code spreading out over the ground.

** "Just before the dawn, when the light's still gone, shine, shine your way…"**

I was fighting a losing battle as I tried to not smile. I liked the song, and I really wanted to know how it started playing.

**"And you may not know where to go. Shine, shine your way…"**

I finally had to grin. The programs in the park started glancing around, wondering what the song was.

** "Open road but it's still dark. Build a fire from a spark, and shine, shine your way, Feed the feeling in your heart- don't conceal it then you'll start, to find, find your way…"**

A dark figure appeared on top of the statue, only a few white lights on their suit. The program was definitely a girl, and knowing that much didn't make me feel so good. I was pretty sure I knew who was behind the mask as they threw two smoke bombs into the air. The park was soon covered in thick smoke.

And I ran.

After getting past the statue, I nearly ran into, and over, the program who'd provided my escape. I smirked. "Skigh?"

Her helmet slid off. Same purple-pink hair, same kind brown eyes, and same little Jump Drive hopping around her feet as we started running. I scooped up the rabbit and glanced over my shoulder in awe as the song kept playing.

** "Morning is breaking. Darkness is fading. We found a way to the light. It's such a beautiful sight. Any time, anywhere, turn around and I'll be there to shine, shine your way. Like a star burning bright, lighting up the darkest night, I'll shine, shine your way…"**

I looked over at Skigh. She was grinning from ear to ear. "That song? You really picked that song?"

"Yep." She laughed. "Paige can have some fun with it."

I rolled my eyes. "Thanks for that. I really needed to get out of there."

"What was that even about? It looked like it started over nothing."

I noticed guards heading in our direction and shoved Skigh into the nearest alley, feeling Jump Drive start moving around. He was probably scared from all the running we'd been doing. "How…" I stopped as the guards ran past, then began my question again by whispering, "How long were you there?"

"How often does this happen to you?" Skigh avoided my question.

I sighed. "Pretty often." I jumped as Jump Drive started licking my hand. What was with this rabbit and licking everyone's hands? "But I'm used to it." Eager to get off the subject, I remembered our earlier conversation. "So, there's still no way back to the User world. I'm really sorry, Skigh."

This plan, my stupid plan… everything I did I failed at. All I wanted to do was save Skigh from dying. And instead I'd trapped her here.

I had failed.

Again.

"It's okay."

I jumped, nearly dropping Jump Drive. What? No, Skigh shouldn't have been saying that. She should've done what everyone else did. She should have- "What?"

Skigh put her hand on my shoulder. "It's okay. You saved my life. I'm alive thanks to you."

"But you're not where you belong. You're here with a stupid misfit!"

Skigh rolled her eyes. "You call yourself that again and I'll smack you."

"Okay, okay…" I stopped looking into her eyes and stared down at the rabbit.

Skigh stepped closer to me. I laughed as she said, "Man, why do you have to be so tall?"

She came closer and I laughed again as Jump Drive hopped out of my hands and onto her small shoulder.

And somehow, suddenly, her arms were wrapped around me again. I hugged her back, my forehead rested on hers.

Skigh smiled. "Hello."

I smiled back. "Hi."

And suddenly, before I knew what had happened, I had my white lips pressed against hers. What had Matt said this was called again?

Kissing.

I never thought that I'd actually… kiss Skigh!

But as we stood in the alley, kissing, I felt something warm cover me. I could feel the heat coming from Skigh as well. I opened my eyes just enough to be able to see and saw both of our bodies dissolving into little blue lines. We weren't derezzing- at least I didn't think we were. Instead of caring, I just closed my eyes again, my lips still locked with Skigh's and that song still playing behind us.

**"Now I can see, you are the one, sent here to show me the way. All of your tears will dry faster in the sun, starting today. Shine, shine, shine- we're on our way. Shine, shine, shine- that's what we say. Shine, shine, shine- shine your way…"**

* * *

_-Lyrics from Owl City "Shine Your Way"_

_-well, i guess you guys liked Jump Drive! :) thanks again for all the reviews- they mean a lot :)_


	10. Chapter 9

**PART TWO: NEVER SURRENDER**

**"I don't wanna feel like this tomorrow. I don't wanna live like this today. Make me feel better- I wanna feel better. Stay with me here now and never surrender…" -Skillet**

* * *

(Matt's POV)

Stupid hospital, stupid smells in the hospital, stupid Alex pacing around so much there'd be a huge hole in the stupid hospital carpet.

Skigh and Mac had no time left. We had twelve hours before we needed to switch the hologram of Skigh with the real Skigh. And I didn't think I could stand seeing Alex go in and sit by that hologram any more.

Alan was tense. If they didn't get back, then the hologram would be discovered, and then Mac and Skigh, and then Alex would be in trouble, and finally Alan would get roped into it.

Stupid, stupid, stupid, stupid everything!

I was so nervous. I wanted to scream. I'd been hoping, praying that they'd make it back. But still nothing.

I started wondering if everyone got like this once they turned twenty. I was so tense.

And I was- we all were- running out of time.

…

Eight hours left.

We had eight hours left before all heck broke loose.

"Alex, if you walk over that spot on the carpet one more time, you're going to be replacing the hole in it," I finally blurted out. I was sick of watching him pace around in circles. (Over the last couple weeks, Alex had insisted that I call him by his first name, and not "Mr. Ryker" like I always had back at REVOLUTION.)

Alex sighed. "We have eight hours left before she's taken off the machines. I'm not going to sit by and watch her die on me!"

I was shocked. Skigh's adoptive brother was a mess. "Alex, are you sure you're alright?"

Alex fell into one of the grey chairs and threw his head in his hands. His grey eyes were filled with tears. "I don't even know any more…" He ran his hands through his black hair and sighed. "I just…" he stopped again.

Now was the chance, my chance to figure out why he hated Mac. "It's Mac, isn't it?"

"Who?" Alex looked up, his face and hands wet from the tears.

"McKian." I forgot that Alex didn't know Mac's nickname.

Alex bit his lip. His eye color and skin turned the same color of the dull tables, dull walls, dull furniture and his dull shirt. "I guess. I," he sighed. "I just don't want to see Skigh get hurt again! You don't know what she's been through!"

"Alex," I shivered as the vent overhead blasted cold air out. I ran my fingers along the dull stitching on the chair. "I don't know the full extent of what happened to her there, but I know quite a bit of it. And I know a lot about where Mac's come from. He'd never hurt her, I swear." Saying I knew a lot about where Mac was from was a little bit of an exaggeration, but at least I knew where he was from.

Alex shook his head. "Matt, for the first year she lived with me, the kid looked emaciated. She was scared of everyone and everything. She was scared to eat anything, she was scared to walk around- Matt, she was scared to even look at me. And I'm guessing she still has the nightmares."

I nodded. "Yeah, but Mac's always there for her when she does."

Alex laughed. "I don't hate McKian. I just don't know enough about him. I mean, his record's full of holes! It just seems too convenient for everything linked to his past to not exist anymore." He sighed.

I'd never seen Alex let his guard down. Something had snapped in him. He was… nice. "Are you actually not snapping someone's head off right now?" Yeah, if he was still my boss, I wouldn't have said that. But, since he wasn't my boss now...

"Well, Ian and I sold REVOLUTION. Fox News bought it, so Ian's going to work with them," Alex grinned. "I guess now I'm just relaxed, now that there's no more death threats hanging over Skigh's head." He laughed. "Why? Was I really that tense before?"

I shrugged, then nodded. Alex continued. "I guess I should just give McKian a chance. He seems like a nice guy, but-"

"Trust me, he's one of the nicest guys ever."

Alex smiled. "Fine, I'll give him a chance. But I still want to know where he's from…"

"Good luck with that," I muttered.

"What?"

"Nothing." I tapped my fingers off the dull chair. "Nothing at all."

…

We had five hours left.

I felt better now that Alex was going to give Mac a chance, but Skigh still wasn't here.

I stepped into Skigh's room and stared at Alan. He was staring at the hologram in the bed. He looked up at me. "She needs to get back here. They both do."

So we had nice Alex and tense Alan.

And I was stuck with both of them in a dull, stupid hospital.

I couldn't believe how realistic that hologram of Skigh was. I just really wished it was really her.

I stared up at the security camera. A little red light blinked on the top. It was still on.

Stupid, dull hospital with it's stupid, dull security cameras!

After staring at the camera for a little while, I noticed the light change from red to white. And then it stopped blinking. When we switched Skigh out for the hologram, and kinda tampered with the security cameras, the camera light had…

turned white.

"Alan," I whispered, nudging Alan. "Look."

Alan looked up at the camera, then his stare shifted to the floor. I jumped back as little blue lines appeared. And quickly two glowing outlines of bodies appeared, one shorter and one taller. I gasped, quickly biting my lip so I didn't make any noise, as Skigh and McKian appeared fully. Skigh's purple and pink and black light-up suit thingy turned into the hospital gown she'd had on before and Mac's blue and green and black suit turned into his blues jeans and black shirt.

I heard Alan gasp too as he realized that they were kissing. I almost laughed. Seriously?! How in the world had they managed to get there?

This was good!

The two of them slowly pulled away from each other, Mac and Skigh staring at each other. Skigh was the first to notice everything. "What happened?!"

McKian gasped as he looked around, still hugging Skigh. "I think we made it back!" I couldn't believe that her hair was not only shorter, but purple and brown.

"You did."

Skigh laughed, blushing as Alan laughed. "Okay, so considering the watch broke, how did that happen?"

I stared at the little creature hoping around on the floor. "Mac? Skigh? You guys bring along a little friend?"

Mac slowly let go of Skigh and grabbed up the little rabbit. "Sort of. Are you okay with a new pet?"

I laughed, but then remembered that the nurses would be back soon. "Hey, it's great to see you two and all, but the nurses are gonna be in here any minute. We gotta make the switch before they get in here."

Skigh poked at the hologram. "This is creeping me out. Let's get this done and over with."

* * *

"And Skigh Ryker has made a miraculous recovery with just four hours left before she would have been taken off life support-"

"Skigh Ryker is, according to doctors, going to be leaving the hospital soon after the accident that left her-"

I turned off the TV in the waiting room and grinned. Nothing about the stupid security camera not working. That was good.

Skigh was leaving the hospital tomorrow. I couldn't believe we'd managed to pull that off.

Now the next thing I wanted to get to the bottom of was how Mac and Skigh were kissing. Thankfully Alex wasn't around for that.


	11. Chapter 10

(Skigh's POV)

"I'm really sorry about that," Mac mumbled, rubbing the back of my hand, his pale fingers tracing the scars.

I could feel my face get hotter as I blushed. "Don't be."

McKian bit his lip. "A-are you sure? I-I mean, I-"

"Mac, it's fine. Really." I was so close to admitting that I had actually liked it when he kissed me.

Mac grinned. "I figured out how we got back here," he whispered, glancing up at the security camera over our heads. I didn't get to leave the blasted hospital until tomorrow.

Yay…

I hated the hospital. I just wanted to get out of here; I could leave, but nope- the doctors wanted to make sure. "How'd we get back?"

McKian's white face turned blood red. "When we kissed, something in your code when I turned you into a program reacted to my code and it re-enabled the function. Now that your injuries are fully healed, you're no longer a program."

"So, is the watch fixed?"

He shook his head. "No. I have to repair the damage on the Grid," he said, his quiet, innocent voice barely audible.

"I can barely hear you," I whispered back, smiling.

"That's kinda the idea," Mac grinned back. "But in order to get back to the Grid…"

I started laughing as I mentally finished his sentence. In order to get back-

we'd have to kiss again.

"Hey, Skigh."

I looked up, away from McKian kneeling beside the bed and saw my brother peek his head around the door. "Hi, Alex."

Braced for him to get on Mac's case. I knew that Alex didn't necessarily care for McKian, and I was ready to rip my brother to shreds if necessary.

I felt my jaw drop, and there was no fighting the shocked expression that I knew was on my face as Alex smiled at Mac and walked around to him; he held out his hand to Mac and they shook hands.

After five minutes of Alex smiling and acting, well, not like he usually did, I started wondering if he'd been hypnotized or drugged or if someone had a gun on him, making sure he acted, well, nice. This wasn't Alex. He was being NICE for crying out loud. Maybe a mental breakdown or something…?

I had no idea.

And then Matt walked in. And then Alex smiled more.

Had we passed into some alternate universe here? I mean, seriously, since when did Alex smile this much?

Alex's black hair fell in his eyes from not being cut in a while. "Hey, Knight!"

And since when did he give people nicknames? (Yeah, it was just Matt's last name, but still…)

Yeah, definitely in some sort of alternate universe.

Matt grinned. "Hey, Alex. Skigh, the doctors are thinking of letting you leave early," he tacked onto his greeting.

"Thank God!" I was sick of sitting in this bed. I'd only been back in it for a couple hours, and I was ready to scream my ever-loving head off. "So, uh, you're 'Knight' now?"

Matt, or "Knight", nodded. "Yeah, Alex called me that, and I kinda liked it."

It. Was. His. Last. Name. Really? Anyone could call him by his last name!

But Alex seemed nicer, so…

…

"Alex and Ian sold REVOLUTION."

I stared at Knight in shock. "What? They did WHAT?!"

Mac shrugged, holding his hands up. "Don't look at me here! I wasn't here to hear that!"

"So, Knight," I had a hard time adjusting to replacing Matt's name with Knight. "Who bought the company?"

"Fox News. Ian's going to work with them and Alex is retiring."

As I slipped on my grey hood with some help from McKian, I guessed that the whole sale of REVOLUTION was why Alex was so calm now. It made sense.

But now I needed to stop thinking about my brother actually acting like a normal human being and start wondering how many times the doctors were going to keep poking and prodding me until I walked out the door in the next few minutes.

The walls seemed to be closing in; the dull grey and harsh lighting glaring off the white (and blood-splattered in some places) tile were a little intimidating.

Time to get out of here.

* * *

I slowly closed the closet door in the auditorium closet down, a bottle of Windex nearly falling on my head. Mac laughed as he grabbed it and crammed it back on the shelf, two feather dusters showering us in dust.

I blushed a little, trying to stall, though I wasn't quite sure why. "Um, are you sure M-" still not getting his new name right "-Knight has enough footage to work with?"

Mac nodded, and when I finally mustered up enough courage to look up at him without instantly looking elsewhere, I noticed he was blushing too.

We were both nervous about doing this again; I feel really stupid now, considering it was just a kiss. But still…

"Ready?" McKian gently pulled me against him, hugging me again.

I nodded. "Yeah."

I closed my eyes as we kissed again.

I felt the air around us get colder. I didn't have to open my eyes; I knew we were back. As Mac slowly unwrapped himself from around me, and his lips left mine, I smirked.

Time to annoy CLU.


	12. Chapter 11

(Skigh's POV)

"So, are we blowing something up? Infiltrating something? Getting on CLU's nerves?"

Mac's laughter was drowned out by the noise, I mean the music (this song wasn't my favorite), in the club. "Doing anything to promote the uprising will get on CLU's nerves."

I rolled my eyes. "Gee, I care so much." I looked around at all the other programs; no one else seemed to be plotting anything.

Except for Beck over in the corner with Zed and Mara.

McKian followed my stare over to the far corner, and he looked away. "I think I should avoid them for a while."

I frowned at him, then realized why he suddenly crossed his arms on the table and buried his head in them. He was afraid to be around Beck after the incident in the park.

And I couldn't blame him. "Do you wanna leave, or-"

"No," Mac mumbled, rubbing his forehead. I started wondering if programs got headaches; McKian looked like he had one as I heard him groan from the other side of the booth.

I glanced back over my shoulder at Beck and his friends. Beck didn't look too thrilled, either. Zed and Mara looked happy, and I noticed that whenever they looked at Beck, he would smile; the second they looked away, his smile was gone.

I started wondering why. Maybe he was just tired; maybe he was thinking about Able; for all I knew, he was seeing the crane explode with Able inside it again and again, or reliving his fights with Cyrus. He had a lot of things to think about. And at the moment, so did we.

Turning around, I tapped the glass of energy in front of me, the glowing liquid sloshing around as the glass shook. I still wasn't quite used to the stuff. Drinking something that glowed... it just sounded scary.

There was a lot of stuff I still had to get used to.

I kept glancing around the club, watching for anyone to walk in, or over to us, who could be a threat. I sat up straight as Pavel walked in; I really could've punched him in the nose. He started walking around by the tables. Hoping and praying that he wouldn't come over here, I tapped Mac's leg with my foot under the table and cautiously pointed at the lunatic who'd waltzed in here.

McKian rolled his eyes and glared at him as Pavel tilted his head and walked over to Beck's table. He walked sort of like a chicken. He smirked and it took everything I had to not stand up, walk over to him, and smack him upside the head as his sickening voice began coming out of his mouth. "Well, you three look familiar."

Beck just looked up at him. Zed and Mara just shrugged, trying to look innocent. I started wondering if they were still at the garage or not; I hoped they were.

Pavel crossed his arms behind his back and his cocky smirk grew. "Well, you definitely look familiar," he drawled out, his eyes boring holes in Beck.

Beck finally glared at him. "Really? I don't know why."

I noticed McKian inching towards the edge of the booth as Pavel stepped closer to Beck. "Yes, I definitely know you."

"I'm going to smack him," I muttered, slowly sliding across my seat and glancing around as other programs in the club looked over at Pavel.

"Hm... where have I seen you before?" Pavel tapped his chin, looking even more like the imbecile he was. His gaze shifted for a second. "Now you two I remember," he snapped. "But I can't remember where I know you from."

Mac stood up. "That's it." I had no clue what he was going to do, but I hoped he won't get himself killed. "So, Pavel, you don't remember me?"

I froze. What was he doing?!

Pavel whirled around, his eyes wide. "Oh, how could I forget the misfit? Yes, someone who doesn't fit in at all... CLU would probably find you imperfect."

"I think he'd say the same about you," Mac returned, crossing his arms. I saw him tap his watch as his arms folded over his chest. This was not going to end well at all. At least he'd gotten Pavel off Beck's case, but still...

Pavel held up his hand. "How dare you say something like that to a COMMANDER!"

McKian rolled his eyes.

"You really think you're better than me?"

"Um, I wasn't gonna say anything at first..." Mac shrugged.

Pavel laughed, and I almost puked. "Fine. You fight me, right here, right now, and I'll show you I'm better."

McKian stared at the commander, not answering as Pavel threw the first punch. Mac grabbed his arm and flipped Pavel over his head; I grinned as Pavel hit the floor. He bounced back up and tried kicking Mac, but McKian ducked. Pavel tried punching him again, several times, but Mac dodged every punch and tackled him to the floor. He jumped off him as Pavel drew his disc and activated it.

"I'm better!" Pavel screamed, throwing his disc. McKian didn't even draw his; instead, he grabbed Pavel's and threw it back at him, the edge barely missing Pavel's head. He tackled him again and pinned him down.

By now, everyone was standing, watching them. Beck looked a little nervous; he kept glancing over at the door.

Paige.

I smiled as Paige smirked while Mac pinned Pavel down. "I think you need some practice, Commander. You seem a little rusty." He got off Pavel and tapped his watch again.

Beck relaxed and sat back down as Pavel rushed out the door, past Paige. He made eye contact with Mac and mouthed, "Thanks."

A tiny smile appeared on Mac's face as he nodded and walked over to the booth. "Sorry about that."

"Why are you sorry? You slammed Pavel into the floor! I'm just jealous that I didn't get to do that!"

"He had it coming sooner or later." Mac sighed. "We should probably get out of here."

I nodded and got up, the majority of the programs still watching us as we walked out.

* * *

"He's gonna get himself killed!" McKian jumped down to the next roof, and I followed him. We'd been hopping around the roofs, following the Renegade. Beck hadn't even noticed us yet; he really should have.

I tried to get a decent breath with my mask on. "I have no clue how you can do this so easily!" I gasped, watching as Mac and Beck made jumping across rooftops seem really easy. I was pretty sure I'd twisted my ankle at some point.

Beck kept going, and eventually it seemed like he was just going in circles; we weren't getting anywhere, and the building that we were standing on top of now we'd already jumped onto and off of twice. "Mac!"

McKian stopped before he would have jumped to the next roof. "Yeah?"

"We're going in circles."

I wish I could've seen his expression behind his mask. "What? That means-"

"We need to get out of here. NOW."

Mac nodded. We found a ladder leading from the roof into a dark alley. Well, at least it was a way off the roof.

As we climbed down, I laughed. "Hm… dark alley sounds very safe."

Mac, below me on the ladder, laughed too. "It's just an alley," he replied. "See, I'm standing in the alley. Nothing down here."

"How can you see anything?" I muttered as I tried to make my feet stop shaking so I could actually climb down the last few rungs on the ladder. I sighed in relief as me feet touched the ground. "Now what?"

Mac wasn't answering. In fact, he hadn't said anything in the last few minutes. "Mac?" I felt my stomach twist.

Not good.

As I turned around to walk out of the alley, I felt something slam into the back of my head. I fell, groaning as I hit the ground. That did not feel too good.

And the orange lights hovering over me didn't look so good either as I passed out.


	13. Chapter 12

(Mac's POV)

Okay, that hurt!

I groaned and tried to sit up. I groaned again as I realized my hands were cuffed behind me. The cuffs weren't the best fit, mainly because of my watch. I slowly opened my eyes.

It was dark.

"This just gets better and better," I muttered, managing to kneel as I discovered that my feet were bound, and linked to the cuffs on my wrists.

I couldn't see anything at all. Maybe my mask-

was off.

This cycle just got worse. I felt bad for dragging Skigh into all-

SKIGH!

Great, now I was tied up and Skigh was... somewhere.

I couldn't access my watch so I could use the recoder to pick the lock on the cuffs. I could barely feel my hands anyway.

"Hello."

I jumped. That voice didn't sound so good. I was too busy worrying about Skigh to guess as to who's voice it was. "Hi," I snapped, wishing I could get rid of the cuffs.

"You could have been derezzed for what you pulled before," the voice growled.

I rolled my eyes. "Yeah, I know."

"You don't seem too concerned."

I still didn't know where the voice was coming from. But the guy was annoying. "Are you gonna derezz me?" If he was, I needed to know so I could start praying for a miracle, not like I wasn't already.

"You're not scared, are you?"

Well, so much for an answer. "No."

"You really believe that Tron's alive?"

Okay, this sounded way too familiar. "Yes." I wasn't about to go explaining myself on that, for obvious reasons.

"Interesting..."

I rolled my eyes and glared in the direction of the voice. This program was getting on my nerves.

I winced as the cuffs were squeezing my wrist, and it felt like my arm and the watch were being crushed. And since the watch was tied in with the rest of my code, the pain wasn't just in my arm.

I heard footsteps, but I still couldn't see anyone. I gasped as the pain got worse. I couldn't move to prevent the pain, and if it got much worse, I would pass out.

"What's wrong? Are you sure you're not scared?"

I glared in the direction of the voice. "I'm not scared," I managed to get out before before I fell from my kneeling position back to the floor. That hadn't helped any.

I closed my eyes, seeing the same thing whether they were opened or closed. I felt someone roll me onto my side, the pressure on my wrist lessening a little. I was still in severe pain, and I winced as the program started feeling around the edge of the handcuffs.

I finally couldn't take the pain any more and passed out.

* * *

_Thanks for all the reviews :) i really appreciate them :)_


	14. Chapter 13

(Mac's POV)

Okay, no more passing out! And hopefully, no more getting knocked out!

I didn't feel any pain, thankfully.

"He's waking up."

The same voice echoed from before. I felt a little weak as I tried to open my eyes and failed.

"I told you we didn't need to do that."

Another distorted voice.

The first program spoke again. "Well, what else could we have done?"

"Anything that wouldn't knock him out?! Hey, now there's an idea!"

I forced my eyes open, blinking as everything came into focus. I looked up at the two programs towering over me. I was glad the cuffs were gone, but the floor wasn't exactly the most comfortable place to be laying. I looked up at the two programs standing over me and... was really hoping by this point that they hadn't looked at my disc.

"Are you alright?" The first one asked, kneeling beside me. The black suit and minimal white circuits were instantly recognizable. I nodded.

And if that wasn't enough, then the fact that the Renegade was standing behind him was.

"Are you sure?" Beck asked, kneeling beside Tron. "You've been out for a while."

I nodded again. "Yeah, I'm fine." I sat up, then remembered. "Have either of you seen S- the other program that was with me?" I didn't want to say Skigh's name just yet.

I watched as Tron and Beck glanced at each other, then turned back to me. I hated staring at their masks, mainly because it was annoying. "No," Tron answered. "There was no one with you."

"Yes there was..." I tapped the screen on my watch and found the memory of us in the alley. "See?" It showed Skigh climbing down the ladder above me.

Tron nodded. "So you're the misfit."

I shrugged. "Yeah. I see you know who I am." They didn't need my disc to figure out that much.

"And your friend... what's her name?"

"Skigh." Beck offered to help me up, and since I was still tired, I didn't refuse. "I would have thought she was with you-"

"We never saw her," Tron cut me off. I was starting to like Alan better. He walked out of the room, and then I actually looked around at the white walls and then at Beck.

"I'm going to apologize in advance for my friend," Beck said as we started leaving the room.

I smirked. "Why? His sense of humor's not rubbing off on you, is it?" I really hoped the answer was no.

"No, not yet at least. And besides, I'm pretty sure that he doesn't have a sense of humor." Beck laughed.

We walked out of the room and I looked up to see the massive computer in action. I was really sick of seeing them with the masks, and even though it was a long shot, asked, "Do either of you ever take off your masks?"

"Not around other programs," Tron answered. He didn't sound too happy.

"Okay, sorry…" This was one program I really didn't want to upset, especially not when he was looking for Skigh.

But sadly, he wasn't looking fast enough. If Tron and Beck didn't have her, I didn't want to imagine who did. I tapped my watch and started my own search. After all, I was the one who turned her into a mix of a User and a program, and if she was derezzed-

I shook my head and kept entering different codes. I was going to find her. Finally, I found her. "No, oh Good God, no…"

"What was that?""

"Nothing," I mumbled, hoping Tron hadn't made sense of what I'd said. "I found her."

I could tell Tron was shocked. "Already?"

I nodded. "Yeah, and she's-"

"In the games." Beck sighed. "We gotta get her out of there."

"We will," Tron responded and I cringed as he added, "We just need a plan."

I glared at him. "We don't have any time for that!"

"We need a plan before-"

I couldn't take it anymore. "I'm not going to let my friend die in the games! She can't fight well enough to stay alive for long!" The extent of Skigh's many, many previous injuries finally dawned on me. She couldn't fight in the games, not without injuring herself further.

"What do you mean?" Beck sounded a little ticked too.

"She's been injured before and never fully healed- wait, we don't have time for this!"

…

"Okay, there she is." Tron leaned over the top of the Coliseum.

Beck looked back at me. "She's doing pretty well, but she looks a little tired."

"Of course she is! She's overexerting to make sure she doesn't die!" I was getting sick of waiting, not losing my temper, but concerned for her safety. Skigh wasn't doing well at all.

"Okay, when are we getting her out of there?" Now Beck was asking.

"Soon."

I rolled my eyes. "I'm going in with or without you. I'm not going to stay up here and watch her die."

Tron sighed. "Fine. Let's go."


	15. Chapter 14

(Skigh's POV)

I was going to pass out or end up dead- whichever decided to come first.

So far I'd fought three guards. Two were lying in a heap, unconscious.

The third?

The third one was still trying to bury his disc in my shoulder. I really hated the games; Beck made it look easy! And McKian probably would have won by now.

Where was Mac anyway? As I tried to stay alive, I was hoping and praying that he was alive, or on his way.

I backed away from the guard as he threw his disc again, getting dizzy from the way the platform spun. Lost my balance. Fell on the platform below. I grimaced as I tried to stand and felt the pixels of a derezzed program under my hand. I just hoped at this point that I didn't end up like them.

The shouts from all the programs in the Coliseum weren't inspiring. Why were there so many of them here? DId they really want to see programs get killed left and right, and enjoy it? It made me sick.

I felt the platform tremble as the guard leapt onto it, kneeling over me. I twisted out of the way as his disc was buried in the glowing white platform, right where my head had just been.

"This has to end," I muttered, throwing my disc. I wasn't going to kill the guard; I was only trying to distract him long enough so that I could get to another platform. But, instead of doing what he should have, the guard jumped and I screamed as my disc sliced into his arm.

Not what I was hoping for…

He wasn't derezzing, which was good.

I jumped onto another platform, feeling my stomach churn as I realized this one was sideways; trying to look straight ahead resulted into looking straight at the Coliseum floor. Thankful that the pink and purple glowing dress was gone (I'd lost that after I finally got out of that hospital gown, and I'd deactivated the hologram that changed my hair from short to long) and thankful for my hair being short again, I grabbed my disc as it returned and rolled my eyes as the guard came back.

Sadly, he wasn't alone.

I was probably going to die here; four guards versus a teenager who had more injuries than they'd care to count. The odds were definitely not in my favor, not like they ever were, in either world, to begin with.

Pinned down by four guards, in pain, and-

bleeding.

I glanced at my arm, trying not to attract attention to the long slash down my arm that was a mix of blood and pixels.

Something wasn't right. I wasn't supposed to have coding like Mac… was I?

What was going on?

I felt a disc being pressed against my neck and I closed my eyes.

I was done for.


	16. Chapter 15

(Mac's POV)

"HEY!"

I was glad I'd changed my suit to match Tron's, except mine had no lights. The watch was still probably a give-away, but I couldn't have cared less. My scream echoed through the Coliseum, and everyone was silent.

Good.

Beck jumped onto one of the platforms, the Tron suit reflecting off the platform. Tron jumped onto another.

And I took the one Skigh was on.

The guards looked up, and I smiled in relief as Skigh pushed herself up. She didn't look too good, though.

Tron and Beck leapt onto the platform alongside me and I heard Tesler's voice echo overhead, "STOP THEM!"

"My pleasure." I smirked behind my mask and kicked the one guard in the face, then his stomach. He fell to the platform below us and lay still.

Tron had already knocked out one guard, and Beck was helping him with the third, having knocked out one as well.

I helped Skigh to stand up. She was breathing heavy, and leaned close to me, whispering, "My arm…" And then she coughed. I saw blood running down her arm and quickly covered the wound, hoping that no one had noticed, especially not Tesler. The new set of guards rushing at us hadn't noticed yet apparently.

Tron and Beck rushed over. "She's injured," I hissed at Tron. "We've got to get her out of here."

I ducked as a disc nearly went through my head. "I'm not arguing," Beck said, grabbing Skigh and carrying her small body as she shivered. I could tell he'd noticed how small she was. I tuned out the shouting in the Coliseum and focused on the countless guards, and the light jets shooting at us.

Somehow, we got out of there. Everything was a blur, but I remember being on a light jet and glancing over at Skigh as Beck held onto her while flying. She looked very pale and was holding her arm. He kept glancing down at her, making sure she was alright.

Once we got her back to Tron's hideout, I was definitely taking a look at her arm.

I just hoped she was alright.

…

"Mac, I-I think something's w-wrong…" Skigh close her eyes and shivered again as I gently laid her down on the floor at Tron's hideout.

I nodded. "Yeah, something's wrong with your arm. Just move your hand so I can take a look, okay?" I tried to move her hand from her arm, but she only opened her eyes and glared.

"No. S-Something's n-not r-right," Skigh gasped.

She let go of her arm and I stared in stock. She wasn't supposed to be bleeding AND have coding like this. I hadn't done anything to cause this- I'd removed the coding when we got back to the User world, along with the dress and the hologram that hid the drastic change in her hair.

What was happening?

The cut was deep. I grimaced as little specks of blue flowed out with the dark red blood. Was this… some sort of… had the… maybe it was…?

"Skigh, do you know how this happened?"

Skigh mumbled, "No," then closed her eyes.

"How badly is she inj-"

I stared up at Tron, my mask gone, his still there, as he stopped. "She's a user?" He sounded a little shaky.

Skigh didn't open her eyes to look up at him. She just bit her lip as tears start running down her cheeks from the pain. I gently reached up and wiped them away, hoping that she'd get better soon.

I nodded, hoping that he wasn't mad. Afraid to do so, I dipped my fingers in the red-blue sparkly blood on the floor and tapped the watch screen with my fingers. The screen started flashing.

I stood up and let Tron take a look. He was shaking, and I hoped he was okay. I stared at my watch, not believing what I was seeing.

Skigh had become a program-user hybrid. And it wasn't like anyone, or anything, had done this. I could only think of one explanation, no matter how illogical it may have seemed, then or now.

"McKian?"

I knelt down by Skigh and smiled at her as she opened her eyes again. "I think I know… what happened… to me…"

I laughed. "I think I do, too. But-"

"I'm not about... to question it. " She grinned, her face white. "Though I don't know why..." she stopped and started coughing again. "He does weird stuff, and..." she smirked. "My brain won't even begin to comprehend it."

Could she read my mind or something? "Do you think that maybe I came from-"

"Anything's possible, Mac." Skigh laughed, then whispered, "Can I go to sleep?"

I nodded. "Yeah. You'll be fine." I mentally kicked myself, realizing that she may not be fine. But being optimistic was my best option at the moment.

"Alan's gonna kill me…"

I rolled my eyes. "More like he'll kill me. Now rest, okay?" I brushed her hair out of her face and grabbed her hand, rubbing the back of it.

Skigh was asleep in seconds. I stood up and stared at Tron's mask. "So… now what?"

"We let her heal." Tron was still shaky. Great, we'd managed to freak out Tron. Well, I never said I did anything right. "Any more secrets?"

I shrugged. "Well, that depends…"

* * *

"Training simulation?"

Tron jumped. "Yes."

I watched as Tron monitored Beck, Beck still wearing the white suit. "Should've ducked there," I mumbled, watching as Beck got punched in the gut.

Tron turned. "You think you could do better than Tron?"

That really sounded weird coming out of his mouth. "I could give it a shot." I shrugged, tapping the screen on my watch without Tron noticing.

"Alright. You try it."

...

"Loading simulation. Set to medium difficulty."

I rolled my eyes as the computer announced what the setting was. "Really? What did you have it set at?"

"Maximum," Tron's voice echoed in the room, the white walls making it echo more and more.

"I'd like to try it at maximum then," I said, thinking that Tron would think I'd lost it.

"Are you sure?"

I nodded. The blue lines forming around me disappeared and the computer voice (where did that thing come from anyway?) was back. "Loading simulation. Set to maximum difficulty."

That sounded right.

Four guards appeared in front of me. I sighed, realizing that Beck had had a smoke bomb. I didn't.

Well, I didn't really need one.

I ducked as the one guard's fist shot out. I grabbed his arm and kicked his legs out from under him, sending him flying backwards into another guard. The two landed in a heap.

The third one had drawn his disc, and I flipped over his head, my foot connecting with the back of his helmet. He stumbled but didn't fall to the floor. I twisted out of the way as the two remaining guards threw their discs, ducking to miss one and using the wall to do a back flip to dodge the other. I twisted again, grabbing both discs and I threw them at the guards. They ducked, and I kicked the one in the face.

One left.

I dropped to the floor, tripping the last guard and connecting my fist with his chin as he fell. He landed on his back and lay still.

As I stood up, I quickly dropped back down to the floor as another set of guards, six this time, appeared, one throwing his disc. I jumped back up and kicked one in the chest, a domino effect beginning as he fell onto another guard, and then another, and then a fourth. The first two passed out, falling on the other two.

Okay, time to get rid of the other two that weren't in a pile on the floor before they got untangled from each other.

The other two guards had staffs.

Perfect.

As they swung them in my direction, I grabbed the one, pulling it out of the guards hands and brought it up, hitting the other guard in the face.

Another one down.

The three remaining guards closed in. I swung the staff again, hitting two of the guards, but only enough to knock them down, not out. I kicked the one as he stood and he was done.

The other two were also on the floor in a matter of seconds, one on top of the other.

The ten guards vanished as the simulation ended. I slowly got my breath back as Tron's voice echoed again. "Not bad."

I shrugged. "Thanks." I tapped my watch and smiled as the screen stopped glowing.

* * *

_okay, finally got a longer chapter in here! sorry for the others being kinda short..._

_thanks for the reviews, guys! knowing what you think really helps :)_

_have a good day, everybody! :)_


	17. Chapter 16

(Mac's POV)

"Beck!"

I rushed up to him, avoiding the traffic and the programs laughing behind me.

Beck leaned against the wall of a store. "Hey, McKian. What's up?"

"Um, maybe we should find a nice, dark alley with no one else in it to talk about this…" I mumbled, pushing him into the dark alley behind the store.

"McKian, are you alright?" I held up my watch, the screen glowing. "What happened to your watch?"

I sighed. "Yeah, about that… Cyrus happened to it." I glanced at the crack, the dim light overhead showing that the crack had gotten worse.

"WHAT?!"

"You should probably be a little quieter if you don't want to attract anyone to our dark little alley," I whispered. Not everyone needed to know that there was a program running around who was bent on destroying the Grid.

Beck ran his hand through his hair, his face barely visible. I didn't need to see his expression to know what he was thinking. "Cyrus?! How do you know him?"

"Uh, fought him twice, Skigh injured him, he's crazy." I crossed my arms and glared. I'd left out a lot of the details. (Getting thrown over a couch, realizing that Cyrus was created by someone who was just as insane as he was, his creator falling to his death because he wouldn't let us help him, and there was more where that came from, unfortunately...)

"Wait, you actually were able to injure him?"

I nodded. "Well, Skigh did. But he'll probably be coming back, and I don't know what he's going to want this time." That was kind of true. I really didn't know what he was going to want.

With any luck, it would wind up being, always the lucky one around here, me. I wouldn't mind being the one to try to knock some sense into his twisted labyrinth of a mind, but still...

"Yeah, I guess you're- wait, how did you know to tell me about Cyrus?"

* * *

"I feel like puking."

I sat on the floor back at Tron's hideout, cradling Skigh in my lap. She was very weak. "Do you feel any better?"

"A little…" Skigh coughed. She had definitely overexerted in the games. Her arm was a little better, but she was ready to pass out. "Should we go back?"

I looked away. If we did… Alex might find out.

"You're gonna be okay," I whispered, running my hand through her short hair. I'd healed the injury earlier, but she'd lost a lot of blood, and she was too tired to stand. "Do you want something?"

Skigh nodded. "Music…"

I laughed. She always wanted music. For some reason, it seemed to calm her down…

And right now would probably be no exception.

I gently lifted Skigh and laid her head in my lap, that way she'd be more comfortable. I tapped my watch and smiled as she opened her eyes. "I found a song."

Skigh closed her eyes again and nodded.

I tapped my watch again and ran my ran through her hair.

**"Well, I've been huddled up alone by the fire even though I'm not exactly feeling cold. And I've been bundled up for days, too confused to be amazed, at all he icy water in my veins. Why do I feel so alone?"**

Skigh was almost asleep, and she was smiling. That was good.

**"Yeah, I've been moving in and out, of this old split level house, and I'd just as soon burn the whole place down…"**

Over the music, I could hear someone talking. Pretty sure Skigh was asleep, I stood up and gently laid her on the floor. I heard Tron and Beck.

"How did he know to tell you?"

I winced as Beck responded with, "I have no clue. But if he knew that much about Cyrus, what does he know about us?" Great... I really should've thought through telling him about Cyrus a little more. But it was too late to change that now.

"I don't know." Tron sighed. "Maybe we should have looked at his disc."

Not good.

**"'Cause the angriest bark is always worse than the bite, like the ache in my chest that my heart didn't invite. But if the prettiest romance isn't perfectly right, that makes every love lost just a holiday every night…"**

I knelt down beside Skigh again, turning down the music a little. I hoped she'd feel better soon. The song switched and I turned the volume back up.

** "Hello, mercy. I have been searching for you lately. I've been wounded, and from what I hear, you have the remedy…"**

I heard Tron and Beck still talking, but I didn't care. Skigh was who I cared about right now.

**"They told me You would be for me, so now I need to know- is this a love that could save me, or say You will, then don't? Will You stay with me when nobody is around? If this is real, then tell me now…"**

I smiled and gently kissed Skigh's forehead. I almost laughed as she smiled in her sleep.

**"I'm feelin' stronger with You by my side. And I realize You are my hope and I need to know…"**

I kissed her again and ran my hand through her hair. She looked so peaceful right now. I wished she always looked like this, so peaceful and not tense. I wondered if she'd have a nightmare here. If she did, how was Tron going to react? His reaction probably wouldn't be so good.

I just hoped she wouldn't have a nightmare, that way she could relax for once.

**"Can You hold me together? Can Your love reach down this far? Can You hold me together? 'Cause without You holding my heart, I'm fallin' apart…"**

* * *

_-Lyrics from Owl City "Paper Tigers" and Royal Tailor "Hold Me Together"_


	18. Chapter 17

(Skigh's POV)

"You're a user."

I nodded for the millionth time, sick of staring at a black, reflective surface instead of a face. "Yeah."

"You're a young user, right?"

Nodded again. I was a younger one at least.

"So..." The question I was dreading had just started coming out of his mouth. "Why are you here?"

I sighed and hoped that this sounded true. "I'm helping a friend," I answered; that mainly was true. I was helping McKian. From where I sat on the floor, Tron looked huge. He looked more intimidating with that mask, and it sort of felt like I was being interrogated.

"Why are you helping him?"

"Because he's my friend," I responded, glancing over at the stairs leading up to the platform in Tron's lair. I saw McKian walking up them with... Jump Drive in his arms.

Still pretty weak, I pushed myself up and tried to make sure I wouldn't fall back down. "How'd he get here?"

Mac grinned. "He's part of the watch. I guess he can jump between worlds, too, but without the function we need," he explained, handing me the little black and blue ball.

I laughed as J. D. wriggled in my hands, his little clawless paws batting my fingers. "Okay, little squirmy. You need to behave, okay?" I looked at McKian. "Does he eat anything?"

"He can in your world, but here it's just energy." Mac patted his little head, his hand completely covering J. D.'s head. "He doesn't need to eat, but he can."

"Good. Low maintenance rabbit," I mumbled, cradling the bunny against my chest. I tickled his back and he started trying to climb up me.

Tron walked over. "What's this?"

"A bunny." I held him up, watching as Tron took a couple steps back; he seemed scared of him. "He won't hurt you."

"Did you create him?" Tron inquired, slowly reaching out to touch Jump Drive.

McKian looked down. "Sort of. The watch kind of did." No wonder the little ball of curiosity had stumbled onto the Grid. "He's harmless, though. You can hold him."

I almost laughed as the bunny licked Tron's finger. Tron jumped back. "Why is it doing that?"

"He likes you," I said, unable to stop myself from laughing. "You really can hold him."

Cautiously, Tron took J. D. in his hands. The bunny started licking him again, and I smiled as Tron tilted his helmeted head. "What are you?" he muttered, letting the rabbit sit in his hands. "Can you make him stop licking me?"

"Sorry, I don't think I can," I giggled, watching as Mac covered his mouth so Tron didn't see him smirking. I never imagined the protector of the Grid holding a little bunny.

"What is that?"

Whirled around. Beck was standing there, white suit and mask. "What is that thing?" he asked again, stepping over faster than Tron had. "Why is it here?"

"This is a bunny." Mac took the rabbit from Tron and stroked his back. Tron relaxed as the rabbit left his hands. Little Jump Drive rolled onto his back in Mac's hands.

Beck reached out, not as nervous as Tron, and gently rubbed the rabbit's belly. "Why is it covered in hair?"

"All rabbits are covered in fur," I explained, watching as his hand shook a little.

"But I thought you called it a bunny. How is it a rabbit?"

Mac laughed, not teasingly, but just to be nice. "You can call him a rabbit or a bunny."

"Him?" Oh, good God, no... "How can you tell?" Beck kept asking questions while Tron stared at us, still nervous around the little ball of fluff.

Mac blushed and bit his lip; his answer was going to be interesting. "Um... I'm not too sure. But I know Jump Drive's a boy."

"Jump Drive?" Either Tron snorted or growled. "How many names does this creature have?"

"He's a bunny," I retorted as Jump Drive crawled onto Beck's hand. Beck stood stone still, watching as the rabbit slowly inched up onto his arm, then started licking him.

I was pretty sure Beck was smiling under his mask as he said, "I guess he likes me."

Jump Drive leapt off Beck and onto the floor. Tron knelt down by the little black and blue bunny, staring at it as J. D.'s nose twitched. "Is he damaged? Or injured?"

Beck, Mac and I all laughed as the bunny jumped up and batted Tron's helmet. "Nope, he's fine," I managed. I sat down, too tired to keep standing and kept laughing as J. D. jumped up and landed on Tron's chest.

Tron fell back on the floor and stared at the rabbit. "Get off."

Jump Drive didn't get off Tron; instead, he started sniffing his helmet. I smiled. "I don't think he heard you."

"Off." Tron picked up the rabbit and set him on the floor. J. D. jumped up on him again before he could stand up.

"Okay, little guy, get off Tr- our friend." I winced as Mac nearly slipped; he recovered fast enough that I was pretty sure Beck and Tron hadn't noticed. Mac gently reached down and picked up J. D., rubbing behind his head. "You stay with Skigh, okay?"

I took the rabbit from him, and grinned, making eye contact with him. He shrugged and stood up as I started petting J. D.

I really hoped Tron hadn't noticed.

Not just yet, at least.


	19. Chapter 18

**PART THREE: IF MY HEART WAS A HOUSE**

**"Risk it all, 'cause I'll catch you if you fall. Wherever you go, if my heart was a house, you'd be home…" -Owl City**

* * *

(Mac's POV)

"No, we don't bother the big guy in the black mask," I whispered to Jump Drive as he tried to hop over to Tron again. From where I sat on the floor with Skigh and the rabbit, Tron looked very tall. I frowned. "Do you have a name that we could call you?" He probably wasn't going to say much of anything, but maybe he would... in an alternate universe.

"I thought you already had one for me," Tron said, tapping the controls on the computer.

I shrugged. "What is it?"

"'Big guy in the black mask.'"

I rolled my eyes. "No, I mean an actual name." I knew he was Tron, Skigh knew he was Tron and Jump Drive… well, he was hopping everywhere without a care. I started wondering if the rabbit knew who he was. He probably only knew that he was fun to jump on. But I wasn't going to call Tron by his name.

"Yeah, he has one."

Skigh looked up as Renegade Beck walked in. "And that would be…?"

"I'm not saying." Beck walked over to Tron.

I sighed. "We're not going to be able to keep this up much longer. We'll end up telling them," I whispered to Skigh. I was ready to just say we knew who they were at the moment, but that wasn't going to help us out much.

Skigh shook her head. "No, not yet. Right now, we should try to get out of here, see if we can figure out why CLU's not doing anything."

"Maybe he's getting settled in?"

"What does a crazy tyrant do to settle in? Stick his disc through a few dozen programs?!" Skigh rolled her eyes. "We've got to head back soon anyway, or Alex will start asking questions that Knight and Alan can't answer."

I nodded. "Yeah, but how do we tell these two that?"

"We don't. We just say we need to leave for a while, get back to the auditorium, shoot a few scenes, make sure Alex knows I'm alive and haven't fallen off the face of the earth, and get back here."

"Sounds like a plan," I agreed with her and glanced around. "Hey, where's Jump Drive?"

Skigh bit her lip to hold back laughing. "Um, Tron's gonna scream anytime-"

"Get off my foot!"

"-now." Skigh held her head in her hands, laughing.

I laughed too as Beck reached down and held Jump Drive, and I never expected to see the Renegade holding a rabbit.

"CLU's been here for a while, and nothing," Tron muttered. "What's he waiting for? What does he want?"

Skigh looked up at him. "This might be a shot in the dark, but I'm gonna guess the two of you."

Beck shrugged as Tron growled. "What? She's not wrong."

Skigh grinned. "We could head out and try to see what he's up to."

"Out of the question. You're a user."

Skigh glared at Tron. "Okay, I guess you'll just miss the chance to get the most valuable intel on CLU and Dyson."

Tron sighed. "Fine. But be careful. And take your little rabbit-creature with you."

I helped Skigh up from the floor. "We'll be gone for a few cycles."

Tron just nodded and turned around. He threw his masked head back. "I thought I said to take him with you!"

I pried Jump Drive off Tron's foot and smirked. "He'll probably be back," I muttered.

"What?"

I rolled my eyes. "Nothing."

* * *

"There's nothing. CLU isn't doing anything."

I frowned. "That doesn't sound right. He has to be up to something." Skigh tapped on the computer screen that was located downstairs, under the stage at the auditorium. Yes, we were back home. And yes, we'd kissed again. And Knight was editing the footage that we'd just shot.

Skigh rubbed her forehead. "Looks like he's just getting to know his way around Argon. And if he…"

We stared at each other. "He wants the Renegade to pull some maneuver and then get him." Skigh was pretty smart. "So we need Beck to do something."

"If Beck does something, then CLU will start acting," I reminded her.

"Yeah…" Skigh flopped down on the couch, picking up Jump Drive as he started licking a pillow. "No, no, no. We don't need you getting a pillow-fuzz-fur-ball." We had the information. "So, now what?"

Skigh and I made eye contact. And nothing ever good came from that. "We have some time…"

She wasn't seriously suggesting what I think she was. "Are you-"

Skigh blushed. "Maybe? But only if you want to."

Knight was going to get a kick out of this. I nodded and smiled. "I do."

…

"So, is this a date?"

Skigh laughed. "I don't know…" I could tell she was coming up with something. "Wait, it's not a date… I'm only gathering intel."

"Shut up!" I started laughing. When we could finally breathe again, I sighed. "I guess that's a yes?"

Skigh grinned. "Yeah, I guess it is." She sighed. "I've never dated a guy before, so, you're my first."

I was shocked. "What? Skigh, I can't believe that."

"Why?"

I smiled and gently took her small, gloved hand in mine, the glove on my hand preventing me from feeling her hand too much. "Because you're too beautiful to have never dated anyone."

Skigh blushed. "You really think that?"

I nodded. "Yeah. I do." I couldn't go without saying it any longer. "I love you."

Skigh used her free hand to wipe away the tear away that ran down her face. "I love you too."

"I mean, no one else ever gave me a chance like you did. I-I can't believe you had that much faith in me." I felt tears filling my eyes, too. "Thank you."

Skigh smiled, her purple-brown hair falling in her eyes. "No problem."

After a few more minutes, we were back to laughing. A waitress walked over to our booth and I smirked as Skigh adjusted the collar on her black and green plaid shirt. "Hello, may I take your order?"

Skigh looked up at the waitress and nodded. "Yes. Um, Mac, you go first…"


	20. Chapter 19

(Skigh's POV)

As we sat there, waiting for the drinks to come, I kept hearing Mac's voice, echoing.

"' I love you…'"

I glanced over at Mac, who was current burying his face in the T. G. I. Friday's menu. Were we really that similar? Would we really, actually…?

Everything I thought of pointed to yes.

Both of us had on green and black. But that could really just be coincidence.

Both of us were optimistic.

Both of us…

I still couldn't help but smile as I stared down at my black sneakers. And neither of us dressed up (I don't even think I owned a dress at this point), and neither of us wanted anything fancy.

What in the world?! I couldn't…

Me and McKian.

When I looked up, there was a lemonade three inches from my face. I glanced over at McKian, who was sticking his straw into his Sprite. "So, what's Knight gonna say when he hears about this?"

…

"Okay, I'm dreaming! Someone pinch me!" Knight laughed.

I pinched him. "OW!" Knight's headset went flying out of the sound room and across the pitch black (no lights on- I really liked the lights) stage.

"Well, you said to," I responded, shrugging. "Just don't tell Alex yet."

Knight nodded. "I don't think he'd care anyway. I mean, ever since you've been gone this last time, he's actually started to like Mac."

I watched as Mac's eyes nearly popped out of his head. "Well, maybe he won't care?"

"I guess not…" I crossed my arms and tried not to yawn; I was tired, and, considering that it was eleven thirty, me being tired was a given. "But let him find out on his own, okay?"

Knight nodded and slipped on his extra blue glowing headset before editing more footage. "You can count on me. And, uh, why did the little black and blue fur ball disappear?"

McKian looked down and then bent down, then stood up with J. D. in his hands. "Speaking of the fur ball. He's tied in with my watch, so…" Knight could piece together the rest.

And now to get back to Tron and Beck.

…

"Why did you bring that little creature with you?"

I smirked and started rubbing one of J. D.'s paws. "Why? You don't like him?"

Tron sighed and turned around.

With Mac and Beck gone (Beck had to go verify the intel, and I still hated that blasted mask), I wondered if Tron would take his mask off. "Do you ever take off your mask? Ever?"

"No."

So much for that… "Why not?"

"I have my reasons."

Yeesh, Alan, could you at least have given him a sense of humor? "Don't you trust us?"

"I trust you." Tron kept playing around with the computer.

I rolled my eyes. "Obviously, you don't. Or you would have shown us your face by now." Not like I didn't know who he was already. But I wasn't wrong; Tron obviously didn't trust either of us.

Tron sighed again, turning his helmeted head to look over his shoulder at me and Jump Drive. "I do trust you."

I shook my head. "Yeah, right." I sat Jump Drive in my lap and he started licking my leg. "Okay, why do you do that?"

"So I'm not the only one who's annoyed by your little creature's habit?"

I looked down at the rabbit and smiled. "Annoyed? I'm not annoyed by it. I just wonder why he does it."

"What's his name again?" Tron sounded like he was a lot closer than last time.

"Jump-" I looked up and noticed Tron kneeling beside me, only inches away. "-Drive."

"Now do you believe that I trust you?"

I nodded, still in shock that he actually took off his mask.

...

So... now that Mac and the Renegade were back, it was time to see if we could get away from here for a while. "Um, Tron, is it okay if we leave for a while? We have some..." good God, why was I drawing a blank? "...business to attend to... back-"

Tron nodded. I sighed in relief, glad that I wasn't stuttering anymore, but still shaky. We had to get back; if we were always missing, Alex would start investigating, and then if he found out, he'd probably rip Mac to teeny tiny shreds.

As we headed out, I looked over my shoulder. "Mac!" I whispered, tapping his shoulder.

McKian turned and threw his hands in the air. "Sure, now Beck takes his mask off!"

…

"Okay, Twitter questions. Remember, guys, the hash tag is SKIGHMAC, in all caps." I took a deep breath, realizing the full extent of how much things had changed three days ago since the first episode of Renegades was posted on the site. I was shocked that so many people had noticed us already; the site had gotten five million views in the first twelve hours, and the press was already attempting to rip us apart. I liked this better than Uprising. (I always considered Uprising like a therapy for me to get used to not feeling like a failure, like I had for the first fourteen years of my life. Renegades was different- not that I thought of Uprising as a failure; it was one of the most watched shows of the year- and I knew that this was going to go well. It was the way Uprising never could be.)

Mac grinned and tapped the computer screen on the stage as the camera circled us. We were doing a show live, that way people knew we cared about their questions, which we definitely did. "Here's a good one. What are your favorite colors?"

"Okay, that's a good one for you. I know yours," I said, grinning as I adjusted my mic. "I'll have to say purple."

Mac shrugged. "Hm... I'll say green. I like green."

"I was thinking you'd say blue, considering your hair," I mumbled sarcastically.

"Moving on." Mac laughed and ran his finger down the screen, viewing the other questions. "Since you're getting to know us, I'll pick this one. Do you have any pets?"

I nodded, then pushed myself up from my black and blue glowing chair. "Um, speaking of pets..."

McKian smirked. "Okay, why are you out here?" He got up and bent down; the cameras followed him as he reached down and stood up straight with J. D. The little blue and black ball clashed with his orange and white polo. "To answer that question, yes, we do have a pet. This is Jump Drive, and he's a little curious creature."

I smiled as Mac sat the bunny on the desk; the top corner of the massive computer in front of us (ultimate super computer- long story) displayed us sitting at the desk with the questions displayed in a blue box at the bottom. "My turn." Reaching around Jump Drive, I looked for a question. I skipped a few of them, mainly because McKian and I really shouldn't answer them.

Why is McKian so secretive?

How'd he get those tattoos?

Why do both of you dye your hair not normal colors?

Is McKian in the Witness Protection Program?

I finally found one. "This one looks safe," I muttered under my breath before repeating the question out loud. "What is your favorite book?" I sat back in my chair, the back of it adjusting, feeling it snap into position and click against my back. "The Bible probably. That's what got me through the first fourteen years on my life. What about you, Mac?"

"I'd say the same thing as you." Again, we were agreeing on everything! I hadn't influenced him in his beliefs; he formed them kinda the same way I did. "This one right here sounds interesting. Favorite singer or band?"

"Owl City and TobyMac. I'm not choosing one or the other." I picked up J. D. as he started sticking his head over the edge of the desk. "What about you?"

McKian bit his lip. "You had to ask me... TobyMac."

I rubbed Jump Drive's little ears. "You choose the last question. I've kinda got my hands full here."

Mac nodded and found a final question. "Favorite place to go on vacation?"

"Beach, definitely a beach." I laughed as J. D.'s little wet tongue ran over my fingertips. "I think that's what you'd say, too, right?"

"Yeah." Considering that's the only place he'd been to on a vacation, that's the only answer he had.

But at least we were done.

…

"How long are you guys back for?" Knight asked. I looked away from his open mouth filled with chewed up chicken sandwich.

"A couple days. We'll go back at night and then take a break, then shoot more scenes." Sipped some of my tea. I nearly spit my mouthful of the stuff across the room as Jump Drive, sitting in my lap in the grey and black kitchen, decided he wanted french fries. "Bad bunny!" I shoved the fries away from him, some falling on the floor. "No, you don't eat those!" As cute and innocent as he was, J. D. was getting to be a little trouble maker. Still a nice bunny…

Just a curious bunny.

* * *

_Thanks for all the reviews, guys :)_


	21. Chapter 20

(Skigh's POV)

Sleep.

Sleep.

As an insomniac, I really don't sleep unless I'm ready to drop dead.

I'd tried reading tonight but trying to forget my lack of ability to sleep by shoving my face in a book wasn't working either. The words became big jumbles of letters that made no sense; I have dyslexia, as well as insomnia.

Tried music.

Tried rolling over a bazillion and one times.

I tried counting blasted sheep.

Finally, I gave up and buried my face in my pillow, feeling the eyes of the people on the posters on my walls staring at me through the dark. In a room with grey walls, everything else had color.

And right now, in the pitch black, I couldn't see a blessed bit of any of it; the only thing I could see was the faint blue lights on my clock, showing me that it was only thirty-four seconds later than the later time I'd looked.

I sighed. This was going to be a long night.

Not like it was the first.

And not like it was going to be the last.

…

"Where did all these people come from?"

I stared at Knight in shock as he smiled at the streams of people coming throughout he auditorium doors. "Okay, guys, you do not need to buy an actual ticket, but you can leave a donation in the red box."

Donations… we'd talked about this before, and McKian and Knight were actually getting people in here. As I stepped forward, the group around Mac, begging for his autograph, gasped and turned towards me; I laughed as they kept turning their heads from Mac to me. It was a wonder some of their heads didn't fall off. "Hey, everybody," I greeted them as best I could on a half hour of sleep. "Where are we all from?" I added on a question, pointing to the group of at least thirty surrounding Knight, McKian and me.

"They're from the campus two blocks away," Knight explained, handing me my mic. I slipped the headset over my head as he continued. "They saw the show online and wanted to be here for a recording. Can you do a half hour today?"

I grinned as different people in the group began re-enforcing Knight's question with their own pleas. "Okay, a half hour."

"Can you bring out the rabbit?" The "rabbit has a name, people... and I think Jump Drive would like it if you used it.

I nodded and smiled at Mac. He smiled back. He must've gotten up earlier than usual; his hair, though still having it's natural tendency to stick up in every possible direction, was brushed. The sky-blue t-shirt and grey jeans matched his grey and black Nikes perfectly.

Me? I had on-

Good God, not again!

I had on a blue plaid shirt, a pale blue t-shirt and charcoal shorts. And my black sneakers… Had we really managed to do this again?

This was going to be an interesting day.

* * *

"Jump Drive? Where are you?"

I bolted upright in bed, feeling the springs beneath me protest. Hearing Knight say that at- glanced at the clock- six in the morning, over my headphones (another night with little sleep) was not good news. Losing Jump Drive would not be a good thing by any means.

As I pushed myself out of the bed, nervous to know exactly why Knight was screaming his blasted head off, trying to find J. D., I shivered. It was May; probably the idea of wearing a tank top and shorts to bed wasn't my best one yet. I changed into a normal shirt and a pair of longer, mud brown shorts before slipping on my shoes and heading out to see just what good old Knight was up to.

"Knight?"

Knight jumped. "Don't do that! No scaring me!"

Crossed my arms and frowned. He hadn't even put on a shirt; he only had on a pair of black flannel pajama pants and a pair of holly, and stained, white socks. "Where's J. D.?"

"I don't know! He was in my room and now he's gone!"

Great… the last thing we needed was a bunny that was partly computer running around the world. "Maybe McKian's seen him?"

"That's good, that's good!" Knight ran into the living room, if you could call the cubicle a living room. I noticed Mac's tall body stretched out on the couch, with a little bundle under his arm.

"Hi, buddy!" I whispered quietly, slowly taking the rabbit out from under his arm. McKian rolled onto his back as soon as I grabbed Jump Drive and mumbled something in his sleep. He looked exhausted. "Let's let him sleep. He's tired."

Knight nodded. "Okay. I'm gonna go pick up some food. You want a burger or something?"

"For breakfast?"

"Yeah." Knight shrugged innocently.

I grinned. "Sure. But a cheeseburger. I want a cheeseburger."

Knight laughed and grabbed the keys for the Roadster. I smirked. "Knight?"

"Yeah?"

"You might, uh, want to put on a shirt first."

* * *

"What's this?" Alex sat on the edge of the couch, grabbing at the black cylinder on the table with green glowing edges. He'd finally stopped noticing the major change in my hair. "Some sort of stick?"

I gasped. The light cycle! Mac's light cycle! "Um, it's kinda fragile, so I'd be-"

Before I could finish, Alex had grabbed the two ends and was twisting them. He jumped up on the couch as the baton rezzed up into a light cycle.

We. Were. Probably. Going. To. Be. So. Stinking. Dead.

Alex gaped, his eyes wider than they'd ever been; he slowly got off the couch, his jaw hitting the floor, as he approached the light cycle. He ran his trembling fingers over the green lights, then pressed his palms against the black frame. "There's a motorcycle in your living room," he mumbled in amazement. "How in the world..." he dropped to his knees, taking in every single detail.

Mac, who had been sitting by him on the couch with a bag of potato chips, paled. He sat down the chips and started rubbing his tattoos, shaking as Alex stared at the bike. For the two hours he'd been here, Alex had been nice. Abnormally nice. And now...

this could have just crushed everything.

But Alex just grinned. "Wow... how did you get this? This is amazing!"

Mac looked down at his hands, slowly reaching to activate his watch without anyone noticing. He sighed, and I could tell he was waiting for Alex to ask how it was made, and who had created a contraption like this. McKian pushed himself up from the couch and walked into the kitchen, fortunately not noticed by my brother.

I heard a door creak open. "Gotta oil that later," I muttered, getting up from the grey leather couch myself and walking past the little sliver of a wall that divided the kitchen from the living room (it's really just one big room). I smiled, relieved. "Hey, Alan."

Alan took off his coat, his blue eyes twinkling. After being around Tron, it was a little difficult adjusting to seeing Alan smile. "Hi, Skigh. And McKian, what are you doing?"

For the first time, I noticed that Mac was standing over the sink, his white knuckles clutching the sliver and black rim and the dark wooden countertop. "Hoping I don't throw up."

"Why? Are you sick? Are-" Alan stopped as soon as he saw the light cycle that was brushing against the glass coffee table and a red bookshelf; the front end was nearly buried in the flat screen TV and the super computer beside it. "Oh no."

"Oh, yes," I sighed, watching as Alan glared. "Curiousity killed the cat, but apparently it won't kill Alex. It'll kill us."

Alan adjusted the collar on his green shirt and frowned. "He doesn't know that that's from-"

"Nope. I'm hoping that I can convince him it's just something experimental." Who was I kidding? Nice Alex didn't mean dumb-as-a-post Alex.

Alan smirked. "Leave this to me." He glanced at Mac. "And make sure he doesn't puke."

I nodded and hugged McKian; he let go of the sink and kissed my forehead. "What if he finds out?"

"He won't," I whispered back confidently. Everything we'd said in the last few minutes was pretty quiet. I rested my head on Mac's chest and listened to his heart beat slowing down. "Where do you want to go tonight?"

I felt his lips brush against my forehead again. "I don't know. Where do you want to go?"

"To sleep."

Mac laughed softly, then whispered in my ear, "What's that place we went to before? With the fountains and the holes in the ground? We were hitting little balls with sticks?"

I smiled at his description. "Mini golf?"

"Yeah, if that's what it's called."

I looked up at him, his eyes glowing again. His smile got bigger. "What?" I asked, wondering if he was okay.

"Your eyes... they're doing what mine do."

Wait, my eyes weren't supposed to... I looked at the stainless steel refrigerator door and gasped. My eyes were glowing, the mud brown turning almost a golden color. "Is this because of-"

"I think so." Mac rubbed my back. "I think you're the first User-Program mix."

Sighed. "It's an honor," I mumbled, filling my voice with sarcasm.

Mac chuckled. "I love you."

"I love you, too." I buried my face in his black shirt and closed my eyes. After a minute, I slowly opened them, realizing that someone was watching us as we stood there. I saw Alex smiling, sitting on one of the bar stools in the kitchen.

I closed my eyes again and turned my face back against Mac's chest, too happy at the moment to care about what could possibly be going through his inquisitive head. At the moment he liked McKian; but I knew that, inevitably, it wouldn't stay that way.

...

"Why is the rabbit glowing?" Alex asked as he poked J. D.

No use in lying. "It's a digital rabbit, one that I'm not allergic to." It was the truth; I just didn't bother saying where we'd gotten him from. In fact, I didn't even know where Mac had gotten him.

"Oh..." Alex poked J. D. again and, well, Jump Drive didn't like it. He backed away from my brother, his little black body reflecting on the glass tabletop. "Hey, what's wrong, little guy?"

"You poked him," Mac answered for the rabbit, running his fingers along one of the blue lights.

Alex frowned. "So now he won't like me?"

For a twenty-six (almost twenty-seven) year old, he didn't know much about animals. "You don't poke rabbits. It scares them." I rubbed the spot between Jump Drive's ears and his little head shook back and forth as he spread himself out on the table; he looked like a black and blue pancake with a head and itty bitty ears. "You can pet him. He's fine with that," I suggested as Alan rolled his eyes. Even he knew not to poke a little bunny.

Alex tried reaching out to touch J. D. again, this time, petting him. Jump Drive looked up at his hand, his little blue eyes glued to the big guy in front of him who'd just poked his side. He probably didn't know what to think of Alex.

And at the moment, neither did I.

Alan grinned as Jump Drive stood up and hopped over to him on the opposite side of the table. "Hello there." He patted J. D.'s head, and I laughed as the bunny jumped the two feet distance from the table to Alan's chest, his paws grabbing onto his shirt pocket. Alan grabbed the rabbit before he could fall. "Okay, no more jumping for you."

I glanced over at McKian. He was smiling, watching as Alan played with the rabbit. I almost laughed as I compared how Tron treated the rabbit and how Alan did.

Jump Drive started licking Alan's hand and I smirked as he echoed his program in saying, "Can you make him stop licking me?"

...

Dear brother Alex had left; him and his wife Griffyn were going on vacation the next day, and I was glad that they were going to be gone for over a month, traveling around the world. He'd said it was for their anniversary or something, but I couldn't remember what.

And Alan had left as well for a huge ENCOM meeting coming up in a couple days.

So that left me alone with Mac and Knight.

"I'm telling you, the only way we can pull this off is if we shoot a ton of stuff this week and then-"

I cut off Knight. "Dude, it's Saturday."

"Oh..." yeah, when it's ten at night we're going to go shoot enough stuff to use for a month. "Then we'll relax tomorrow- like we always do- and start cramming in shots next week. On Saturday, you two can be long gone and then come back the week before Alex comes back. You'll have two weeks to spend in the lovely computer world and then get back before your brother notices anything." Knight picked up his coffee before Jump Drive could stick his face in it. "You drink this, you fall over dead," he warned the little fur ball. And he wasn't kidding; his coffee was black, and super strong.

I shook my head. "No. We only have to deliver intel, not really show up much. We'll drop by the Grid on and off, and then we'll come right back, that way if my brother shows up unexpectedly, we'll be ready... or at least I hope we'll be."

Mac nodded, throwing his empty can of Coke at the trash can. Jump Drive nearly leapt off the counter as it banged off the edge of the trashcan and fell in, making a racket. "Oops... sorry, little buddy," McKian spoke very softly, lifting J. D. from the counter and into his lap. The shivering bunny rolled onto his back, his tiny paws in the air.

"Roadkill," Knight quipped, putting his cup of coffee back up to his mouth.

I smirked. "Shut up."

All three of us laughed as Mac put the rabbit back on the counter and he picked up one of the apples from the black wire basket in the center of the granite and wooden island. He started licking the red skin and finally got his little teeth into the apple, pulling a very small chunk of red and white from it.

Finally eating something.

I rubbed his back. "Little cutie," I whispered, smiling as he took another bite.

Mac stood up. "I'm gonna go check on the Grid and see if there's any new information for Tron and B- the Renegade." I realized that, with him stumbling to repair his error, we'd never told Knight the Renegade's identity like we'd promised we would.

"Ha!" Knight snapped his fingers, spilling part of his coffee on his already stained t-shirt (the good Lord only knew what else had been unfortunate enough to permanently live on that shirt.) "So his name starts with a 'B!'"

McKian rolled his eyes, glancing at me to see if we should tell him. I shrugged; it really couldn't hurt. "And he's a mechanic. And you only know of one mechanic with a name that starts with a 'B.'"

Knight nodded and rubbed his chin, a little bit of dark stubble beginning to show. "Hmm... don't tell me it's Beck!"

I reached for Jump Drive. "Yep, it is. But you can't tell anyone, okay? We're even excluding Alan from this."

Knight nodded. "I won't tell. And besides, what am I supposed to say? Hey, random person on the street, there's this computer world and a mechanic named Beck is trying to fight a revolution?" He snorted. "Yeah, that'll go real well."

I stared at the twenty year old as he rubbed his coffee colored hands over his eyes. "Well, now you know."

"Yeah, now I-" he stopped, his eyes wide. "Mac? Are you okay, man?"

Mac frowned and followed Knight's eyes down to his hands; little white sparks started covering his fingertips. "I don't know," he said, his eyes starting to glow again. "I never had this happen before."

The screen on his watch flashed green. I bit my lip, hoping that nothing bad would happen. McKian noticed it, too. "I must have tapped the wrong-"

His hands glowed bright blue. I raised my hand to shield my eyes from the brightness, and as soon as I had, it faded.

Mac, Knight and I all stared at the floor, silence hanging in the air for several minutes.

McKian found his voice first and mumbled, "Well, I definitely hit the wrong button."


	22. Chapter 21

(Mac's POV)

I stared at the floor in shock. I hadn't even issued that command on my watch!

Or maybe I'd just messed up again. Either way, still staring at the floor. "I can't believe that..." I knelt down and kept staring at the thing on the floor.

And it stared back.

We all watched as Jump Drive leapt off the counter and hopped over to the thing on the floor. He sniffed it, then tapped it with his paw.

Skigh grinned. "Is this how you made J. D.?"

I nodded. "Yeah, but this one was an accident." We all sat on the floor, watching as a fluffy ball of white, pink and purple finally moved.

It was another bunny.

I smiled as I finally could see its little white ears and body. Little pink eyes finally appeared as it shook its head and the purple-pink lump of hair on it's head moved. It had two pink paws in the front, and no other markings aside from pink lines on its face and glowing purple whiskers. Just by looking at the bunny, I could tell it was a girl.

Apparently Skigh was thinking the same thing. "Is it a boy, or a girl?"

"Girl," I answered, petting the new creation. It was another bunny that Skigh wouldn't be allergic to. Jump Drive started licking my hand as I started petting both of the dwarf bunnies. Both had very short, very soft fur, and both were what Skigh called dwarf bunnies. And both of them were very cute.

Knight's dark skin paled. "So does that mean that they can..." oh, no... "have digital bunny babies?"

"No." I laughed as Knight relaxed. "They can't."

"Good."

Skigh laughed too. "What? You don't feel like being an uncle?"

"Not yet. Still waiting to hear if my sister had her twins yet." Knight sighed. "So... what do we do with the newest addition?"

Skigh scooped up the white and purple bunny. "Name her."

I picked up Jump Drive. "Let's sleep on it," I suggested, watching as the rabbit started squirming in Skigh's hands.

But in reality, I wasn't sleeping tonight.

I was figuring this out.

...

"No, I can't... why would I... why would You even care...?" I started every question and never finished it, sitting on the couch, wishing I could figure out why I had to be some miracle.

My existence... my watch... my abilities...

"Why me?" After staring at every single piece of my code for hours, I finally gave up, the blue watch screen flickering off and letting the room go black.

I could create new codes, new programs, and no other program could. I was...

What was I?

A misfit.

A program who could be good at just about anything by tapping a watch.

A creator of new codes and...

Why?

"God," I could always talk to God, but I never knew why He bothered to listen to me, "I don't know why you gave me this watch, and I don't understand why I was even created, yet." I sighed and threw my head in my hands. "Not that I don't want to exist, but I just wish I knew what You want me to do. Creating rabbits just doesn't seem like my purpose..." I couldn't think of anything else, except, "And please watch over Skigh. I love her a lot. And the Grid, please keep an eye on that, too, please..." I finished, exhausted.

I could create stuff now.

This was only going to get weirder.

...

"Pinky?"

Skigh rolled her eyes. "No, Knight."

Knight tried again. "Cotton Candy?"

"No."

"Berry? Fuzzy? Fluffy? Candy?"

"Shut up."

Knight gave it another shot. "Princess?"

"No." I laughed, watching as Skigh held both rabbits in her lap. Knight had been saying name after name. And Skigh didn't care much for them.

And neither did I.

"Well, what are you naming it if you hate all the names I've said?" Knight asked, picking up the new bunny and holding it.

Skigh shrugged. "I... I don't know. It was definitely a random occurance, a rabbit appearing out of nowhere like that."

"My bad." I picked up the bunny as Knight nearly dropped her. "Okay, you don't get the randomly appearing bunny if you're going to drop her on her head."

"Wait a second..." Skigh grinned. "Oh, man, I can't remember what it is now!"

"What?" Knight tried to pet the bunny again.

She sighed. "Random... dah, I can't remember the rest!"

"Random Access Memory?" I had no idea if that's what she was getting at, but I took a guess anyway.

"Yeah, that's it!" She grinned. "There. Now fuzzy bunny that nearly ended up on her head has a name."

Knight smirked. "That seems a little long. Can we abbreviate that or something?"

"RAM." Skigh grabbed Jump Drive as he tried to hop away. "No, buddy." She laughed. "We're definitely gonna have our hands full with these two."

I grinned, waiting for Knight to leave before saying, "I wonder what Tron's gonna think of another one."

...

"Why is it called Store House Church? It's inside a school."

Skigh shrugged and flipped on the turn signal, the Roadster turning. "I don't know. But it's nice there."

I nodded. "Yeah. Why does the school let them use that auditorium anyway?"

"I think they pay them or something," Skigh answered glancing over her shoulder. RAM and Jump Drive were sitting on the back seat, Jump Drive trying to lick RAM and RAM hopping away from him every time. "So... how are we going to get Beck's mask off without us spilling everything?"

I shook my head. "No clue." I sighed as Skigh turned again. "Maybe we should just let him tell us when he wants to and act surprised."

"If I stare at him with that mask on any longer, I'm going to loose my mind," Skigh muttered. "Maybe he'll just walk in without it?"

"I don't know." I reached back and grabbed the bunnies. I watched as their little glowing eyes started to close. "I think two little somebodies are tired."

I laughed as Skigh yawned. "Make that three," she said, yawning again.

* * *

_-WhootOwlAlto on Twitter named RAM, as well as Jump Drive, and my friends chose the colors again. (Thanks!) :)_


	23. Chapter 22

(Skigh's POV)

"There's another one."

Tron stared at RAM as she sat on his foot in the hide out; they stared at each other, and I stood there, trying not to laugh as Tron sighed. "Is this one going to lick me?" Hmm... this could be very interesting.

"Nope." I smirked as Jump Drive hopped over and licked his foot.

"Where did you two go anyway?" Tron asked, turning back to his computer and tapping the screen.

I looked away from him. "Long story." Wow, talking to him was a lot easier when he had a mask on; I was too used to talking to Alan.

Footsteps.

I turned around and Mac and Beck were walking up the stairs; and Beck still refused to take off his mask.

I. Was. Beyond. Annoyed.

"RAM, don't bother Tron." McKian grabbed up RAM and smiled. "Let him gather intel without bugging him, okay?"

Tron rolled his eyes. "Thank you." He started pulling up different screens and threw his head back, and he stopped tapping the screen. "Stop licking me!"

Beck, McKian and I all laughed. I giggled more as J. D. sat on his foot like RAM had.

Two bunnies running around Tron's lair.

Never saw that coming.

* * *

"That looks way too familiar," I muttered. That blueprint flashing on Tron's computer screen was ominous; I wasn't looking forward to this much.

Beck sighed. "Easy to get into hard to get out of."

"Not if you distract everyone," I mumbled under my breath, making sure no one heard. Not that Beck couldn't handle himself in there, but Mac and I were the first two programs to get in and out of Tesler's ship unnoticed.

I frowned as Tron reiterated the entire mission for the seventh, and fingers crossed for the final, time. I glanced at McKian; he kept glancing away whenever Tron's eyes left us and focused on the screen for a second or two. I watched his straight face slowly crack into a grin as he slowly pointed towards the floor. My brown eyes rolled, waiting for-

"Okay, these two need to be put in a cage! They're distracting!"

I laughed as Tron picked up RAM and J. D.; he activated something on the computer with his elbow and a small blue fence appeared on the floor. He put the rabbits down in it and sighed. "So, you know what you're doing, right?"

The three of us nodded in sync.

"Just be careful, especially you, Skigh," Tron cautioned again, pointing at me.

I smirked. "I'll try my best." It wasn't like I wanted to get injured constantly; I was usually in the wrong place at the wrong time.

"I mean it." Tron turned back towards the computer. I shrugged and tapped McKian's shoulder and he stepped closer to me. "I think Alan would be pretty proud of his program," I whispered in his ear, grinning as he nodded.

"Really?"

I jumped as Beck started laughing. I looked down and saw J. D. on his foot. "Tron, you might want to work on that cage while we're gone."

…

"You two remember what you're doing?"

I nodded, kneeling in one of the crawlspaces in Tesler's ship. "Yeah, we remember." We activated our masks and separated from Beck; I wasn't sure this was the best idea, and McKian wasn't either, but we were here and there was no other plan. Plus, who really felt like questioning Tron? At the moment, not me.

We crawled back to where we were the last time, over the bridge. I smirked and pointed through the grate that allowed us to view the bridge as CLU walked under us. McKian nodded and tapped his watch a few times, a small gun appearing in his hand. The black and blue gun was too small for him to use, so he handed it to me. I pressed the lit up blue barrel against the grate and aimed.

And fired.

McKian laughed. "Nice aim."

"Thanks." I grinned behind my mask as Pavel started screaming, the little blue dart that I'd shot into him still stuck in his side. "3… 2… 1…"

Pavel dropped to the floor, unconscious, unnoticed by CLU and Tesler.

But not by Paige.

She stared at Pavel, and I decided to be nice to her, aiming at Tesler this time. The dart sank into his arm and he wilted, groaning as he bounced off the floor.

Now for CLU.

I sighed as Dyson stepped behind CLU, making it impossible to knock him out. Changed my target. Dyson went down, his head landing on Tesler's chest.

CLU finally looked up from the sickly yellow control panel at Paige. "What happened?"

And then he fell too.

Paige looked around. I looked at McKian. "Do I have to?"

"Yeah." Mac sighed. "Though she is the only one who might actually have a conscience."

"If we get caught, I'm blaming you," I muttered, my sweat finger finally pulling the trigger. Paige collapsed. "At least knocking out CLU felt good."

…

"Where's Beck?" We were standing just outside the ship, right were Beck and Tron had said to go after creating our distraction.

And Beck wasn't here.

Mac's mask slid off. "I think we need to go back. He's still not out here."

I shrugged. "You hear me arguing?"

"Okay, it's unanimous," McKian said as his mask clicked back on. "Let's go."

…

Crawled through the crawlspaces.

Snuck through the hangar.

Checked various rooms, some of which having pixels littering the floor. It was unnerving, having to walk on the remains of someone.

And no Beck.

"You don't think they caught him, do you?" I asked nervously, trying not to puke as I brushed the pixels off my feet.

Mac's shoulders sagged. "I would really hope not but-"

"SURRENDER, RENEGADE!"

Okay, at least it wasn't Pavel screaming. (If it was, I wouldn't have been able to hold back my barf any longer.) "I'm gonna guess he's still fighting."

We pressed ourselves against the wall and my heart started hammering against my chest. Beck was fighting off ten guards, doing well, but one of them was Dyson.

"I thought you knocked him out," Mac whispered as Beck barely missed getting sliced in two with Dyson's disc.

"You always want to sneak out of here…" I rolled my eyes and gagged as Pavel approached. "Why? Don't you like us?"

I sighed. "Apparently that drug wasn't too good."I cringed, my fingernails digging into the cold wall holding me up as Pavel's disc hit Beck's arm, the white suit falling away. Beck groaned and tried to fight back, but I knew that he wasn't going to last, not long anyways.

"Maybe we should go-"

McKian nodded. "Come on."

As we rushed towards Beck, McKian slammed his fingers against the cracked watch screen so hard I thought the crack would get worse; a smoke bomb appeared in his hand and he twisted his fingers over the edge, activating it. He threw it and it twisted in the air before exploding.

"Ahh!"

I gasped as Beck hit the ground, another wound across his chest, blue pixels falling to the floor as Dyson stood over him, an evil smirk plastered on his face as the smoke swirled around him.

Time to wipe that smirk off.

I kicked him in the head, grinning as he fell to the floor. Still holding the gun with the little darts that were filled with God knows what, I put the barrel against his head and pulled the trigger. He fell to the ground, a dart in his temple. Wondering if two darts could knock a program out for a longer period of time, I decided to experiment on Dyson and watched as another dart sank into his chest.

I glanced over at Beck. He was trying to push himself up, but as he did, more blue cubes spilled from his injuries. He groaned and fell back to the ground as Paige kicked him.

"Jerk," I hissed, my helmet making my voice sound more confident than I was as I threw my disc at Paige. She ducked and I tackled her, pressing the gun to her forehead.

Paige smirked. "You really think you can escape?" How could someone so smart be so stupid? Yeesh...

"In a word, yes." I slowly lifted the gun a little and, holding her arms down with one hand, I whacked her with the gun, a small orange nick on her forehead as she passed out. Not the nicest thing to do, but it would keep her out of the way for a while. I was actually being nice to her; I could've shot the same drugged coding through her system that had spilled through Dyson's, but I didn't. I was really hoping that knocking her out with the gun instead of the darts would last longer.

With just about everyone out of the way, I rushed over to Beck, noticing yet another slash through the suit, this one by his neck. He wasn't moving.

Mac came over after kicking a guard in the gut. "Oh no..." He quickly, but gently, picked up Beck. "We've got to get him out of here." I shivered as Beck moaned in pain, more pixels falling away from his neck, the injury stretching itself up under his helmet. McKian rezzed up his light jet and got on, making sure he could also hold Beck.

"Going somewhere?"

I whirled around, glaring as Tesler stepped over Paige and Dyson. "Yeah, we're leaving," I snapped as his hands started glowing.

Great... whenever that happened...

His glowing arm extended, trying to reach McKian and Beck. Mac finally decided to start flying (yeah, sitting there on a light jet? Not the best idea) and circled overhead. Tesler tried again, but missed reaching him again. "Seal the ship!" he yelled, his voice soudning like thunder.

I saw the doors closing and motioned for Mac to get out while he could. He shook his head.

"GO!" I screamed at him, ducking as Tesler's hand would've grabbed my face. I glanced up to see him flying through the doors just before they closed. At least he was out.

"You don't seem to be much of a fighter," Tesler snarled as his hands returned to normal. He stepped closer to me and I fought the urge to back away from him.

I shrugged. "You're right. I'm more of a negotiator." I watched as he tilted his head, a little confused and took advantage of his confusion, punching him in the nose. I swung again before he could recover, amazed that I was actually able to fight someone without passing out. I felt my fist connect with his face and he fell.

I'd knocked out General Tesler.

"Not bad," I mumbled, watching as the guards rushed to the tanks, some already swinging in my direction. "Okay, this could be bad."

I rezzed up my light jet and circled the top of the hangar, dodging the shots as the soldiers opened fire. Holes ripped up the ceiling and the entire base, bits of code flying everywhere. I smirked as I circled by the hangar doors, the bullets ripping through it and destroying it.

"So much for sealing the ship," I muttered, flying through the opening. I felt my stomach twist into knots as I saw McKian flying not too far ahead; I winced as I reached him and saw that Beck's injuries were much worse than before.

If we didn't get him back to Tron's hide out soon, he could derezz in Mac's arms.

And I wasn't letting that happen.


	24. Chapter 23

(Skigh's POV)

"What happened?!"

I helped Mac lay Beck on the floor and retracted my mask before saying, "We got out on time, but he didn't."

"And you went back?" Tron frowned. "You could've been kil-"

"I'm not letting him die," I snapped, concerned with how little time we had to attempt to save Beck.

McKian tapped his watch and his mask vanished, revealing his face turning white as he brushed his fingers over the wound racing up Beck's neck. Beck groaned, and I winced as his head rolled to the side and the seconds ticked by. "Sorry," Mac said sympathetically, watching as his watch flashed bright red. "Okay, we definitely need to use his disc to fix this." He looked up at Tron, waiting to see if we were allowed to.

Tron nodded and stepped back.

Gently rolled Beck onto his side. McKian grabbed his disc and laid him flat again, his helmet clanking off the floor. He pulled up so many windows and holograms that the intense motion of the lights started making me sick. I looked away from him and grabbed Beck's shoulders as his body shook. "Did you hit anything?" Convulsions... not good.

"No, he's starting to derezz, though," McKian answered. He sounded like he was having normal relaxed conversation, not freaking out because someone was really to fall apart, literally, in their hands.

He rewrote some of the codes and I sighed in relief as Beck stopped shaking. Instead, he coughed, gasping for air. I looked at Mac, his face asking the question I was ready to ask Tron. And even if he said no… "Can the mask come off now?"

Tron nodded again. He didn't look too thrilled at the fact that Beck was being unmasked, but that mask would have come off, even if I had to smash the blasted thing.

McKian ran his glowing fingertips over several holograms and Beck's helmet and mask disappeared. I started helping McKian repair the damaged codes as I heard Beck's erratic breathing start to level out. Not bothering to really focus on his mask being off (finally), I helped Mac enter the codes that would stabilize Beck long enough for us to repair his injuries. I'd been hoping and praying that we could save him. This was one prayer that really needed to be answered in a way that would put the odds in Beck's favor- not trying to tell God how to do his job- but Beck needed to survive; he deserved to.

As soon as we'd managed to make sure his system was stable, a loud cracking sound started echoing through the air. I turned and gasped as the wounds started getting worse. "Where's Alan when you need him?" I muttered, watching as the streams of code started swirling around on Beck's disc.

I heard someone gasp, and I assumed it was Beck; I watched as McKian pulled off his disc and activated the rim. "What are you doing?"

Mac sighed. "If you can do damage with recycled code…"

I glared at him as I realized what he meant. "What are you-"

Before I could stop him, Mac had pressed the edge of his disc into his arm, his right arm. I grimaced as sparks flew from the disc, and he quickly put his disc back, grabbing a handful of pixels from his arm. I was surprised that he didn't scream; the pixels flowing from his arm didn't look too comfortable. Tron stared at him in shock.

The blue gashes cracked again, little grooves of glowing blue slowly creeping up the suit. I watched in shock as McKian, with a gaping hole in his own arm, quickly, and somehow, mixed Beck's code with his, creating a code compatible enough to repair the injuries. "I'm no medic," McKian said, his voice shaking. "But his code needs so be re-enforced with a stronger code."

"Yours." I gritted my teeth and held Beck down as McKian took the little cubes from his own arm and placed a few in the wound on Beck's chest; then his arm; then his neck. I stared in shock as little bits of codes formed from Mac's and quickly filled the injuries with skeletal cubes.

Then the cubes filled themselves in and Mac pressed his fingers against one of the wounds again, Beck's groan not as loud and pain-filled as before. "He'll be weak for a little while, but he will make it." Once again, Tron's cage failed and Jump Drive was sitting by Beck's head, his little pink tongue running up his cheek. RAM hopped over the side of the cage and joined J. D., her little paws in Beck's hair. I looked up at Tron, who really by now should have picked up the rabbits and put them back. Instead, he let them try to comfort Beck.

I noticed Beck's closed eyes flutter open for a second, then close again. We gently put his disc back and stood up, Mac holding his arm, the blue gash glittering from in between his fingers. "Are you gonna be okay?"

Mac nodded. "I'll be right back." McKian walked down the stairs and I heard the doors click shut. He looked like he was going to fall over.

I heard the gasping again. Hoping it wasn't Beck, I turned around and saw it was Tron. "Are you alright?"

Without his mask, I was scared. And he definitely looked at least a little shaky. "Did you…" He stopped and cleared his throat. "You should make sure your friend is alright. He sliced his arm pretty good."

I nodded and walked out of the room to find McKian. I glanced over my shoulder and saw Tron kneeling beside Beck, not even bothering with the bunnies as they curled up on both sides of Beck's face and fell asleep.

Why was Tron so nervous all of a sudden?


	25. Chapter 24

(Mac's POV)

"I'm starting to think that Beck and Paige are a lot like Romeo and Juliet."

I frowned and stared at Knight. "Who? Beck and Paige are like who?" I was pretty sure I'd never heard of them, and from Knight's tone, I wasn't sure if I wanted to.

Skigh sighed as I wrapped my arm up behind her back. Her head rested on my chest and I could feel her breathing through my grey shirt. "Yeah, they're just like Romeo and Juliet, minus the fact that Romeo secretly marries Juliet, Juliet's supposed to marry another guy, Juliet fakes her death, Romeo kills himself, and then Juliet kills herself. Yes, Knight, they're very similar."

I rolled my eyes. "Okay, who are you talking about?"

"Oh, it's a play that made my head want to explode in ninth grade," Skigh muttered. "That's time in my life I'll never get back." I started thinking again. Didn't Skigh drop out in ninth grade when she was adopted or something? Yeah, that sounded right...

Knight smirked. "Ah, come on. They're similar."

Skigh shrugged. "Well, Beck and Paige are from opposing sides."

"See?" Knight snapped his fingers.

"But, well, that's about it. I mean, I don't remember Beck killing anyone, or Paige being twelve, or-"

"I get your point," Knight laughed. "But I just see a tie-in there!"

Skigh's small shoulders shrugged, and I bit my lip as my arm started throbbing under the overload of bandages wrapped around my injury. "I can see where you're coming from, but I don't see Beck as Romeo." She shifted on the couch in the living room, setting her feet on the coffee table as RAM hopped onto her lap. "Hello. Now," she picked up the bunny and waved it's one paw at Knight. "You tell that guy over there that he's crazy, okay?"

"I am not."

Skigh looked at the bunny. "Denial. Tell-tale sign that he's crazy."

I laughed and kissed her forehead. "I concur."

"Eww, mushy stuff." We laughed as Knight stood up and walked into the kitchen. "Getting take-out. Chinese or pizza?"

"Chinese."

Knight nodded and picked up the phone. "Okay, I'll go call and leave you two alone so I can avoid your mushy stuff."

Skigh picked up a piece of paper on the table and wadded it up in a ball, then threw it at Knight's head, whacking him in the head. "Shut up and make the call, bright wonder."

…

As soon as Skigh and Knight were asleep, I walked into the kitchen and flipped on the lights. Jump Drive and RAM kept hopping around my feet as I walked, or limped really, and I tried to avoid stepping on the tiny bunnies under me.

I fell against the counter, my gloved hands catching me as my stomach hit the edge hard. The cold counter top hit my fingertips and I shivered as I tried to open one of the drawers. I finally got it open and fumbled around inside pulling out a pair of scissors.

I slipped the blade under the bandages on my arm and sliced them off, letting the blood-soaked cloth-stuff fall onto the counter. I stared at the gash on my arm and sighed.

Blood was still running from the slash that ran from my wrist to my elbow, and I cringed as the cut burned. The deep gash would heal better here in this world.

At least I hoped it would.

I turned on the sink and stuck my arm under the freezing water, washing the blood down the drain. I tried distracting myself from the red stuff continually oozing from my arm. I thought about how CLU wasn't doing anything yet. I thought about Beck recovering. I thought about Cyrus possibly attacking Beck and Tron again.

I winced and pulled my arm out from under the water, the blood beginning to flow again. At least Beck was safe.

But I probably wasn't.

I remembered Skigh rubbing something on the injury, saying it would help to prevent infection. I limped into the bathroom and came out what seemed like hours later with a small tube in my hand. I twisted the cap off after trying to for a while and didn't even have the strength to grab it out of the sink. I squeezed the whitish stuff onto the cut and gritted my teeth as it burned, worse than last time. I rubbed it into the cut, and I gasped, trying to breathe easily, as the whitish stuff mixed with my blood.

I wasn't going to go wake up Knight, and I definitely wasn't waking up Skigh. I didn't want to bother them. But as I grabbed onto the counter and gasped, I wondered if maybe I should. My arm wasn't feeling any better.

I tapped my watch screen with my bloody fingers and stared in shock was the screen seemed to absorb my blood. The screen glowed and showed several codes.

And then the burning started to fade.

I stared at my arm in awe as the wound started to close, both ends returning to normal, without the blood. The cut was gone. So was the pain.

I stared at my watch. "I'm afraid to know what you'll do next."

* * *

"Skigh?"

"Mhmm… sleeping."

I laughed and watched as Skigh twisted on the couch, her head on my chest. "Skigh?" I said again, wondering if she'd wake up this time.

"Skigh's not here right now," she mumbled, her voice muffled by her face being buried in my shirt. "Please leave a message and it will be ignored…"

I sighed, realizing she wasn't waking up. I wrapped my arms around her, gently lifting her onto my lap. I ran my hand over her pink pajama pants, removing the wrinkles. I jumped as my fingers went through a hole tearing through the side of her pants, my fingers hitting her cold skin. She shifted on my lap and mumbled something. I moved my hand off her shoulder and shivered as my fingers ran over the scars on her left arm. I rubbed my fingers along the edge of her green t-shirt sleeve and sighed. "Skigh?" I gently reached up and wrapped my fingers around her shoulder, her cold skin very soft.

She didn't respond this time.

I smiled and gently pressed my lips against her warm forehead. She moved again and opened her eyes as I pulled away. She looked up and smiled, then wrapped her little arms around me. "How long have we been out here?"

"A while. You're really tired." I held her again, pulling her close and kissing her cheek this time.

Skigh sighed. "Where do you want to go tonight?"

"Somewhere." I brushed her hair out of her eyes. "The mall?" I remembered her saying something about needing to go there earlier, and we had another day before we were needed on the Grid.

"Okay…." I smiled as Skigh fell asleep again.

* * *

Thanks for the reviews, guys :)


	26. Chapter 25

(Skigh's POV)

"Kill. me. NOW."

McKian stared at me like I'd lost it. "What?"

"Just knock me out or something! I..." I sighed and threw my head in my hands, banging my elbows off the countertop. "Ow."

"What's up?" Mac rubbed my arm and I smiled at him; whenever he did that...

I took a sip of my orange juice before explaining. "We were invited to the president's dinner tomorrow night."

"Well, we can go. Tron doesn't need us. What's the big deal?" Mac tossed his empty plastic cup into the garbage can.

"The big deal is that I have to wear a dress," I spat out the last word, hating it.

McKian shrugged, then his face paled. "Wait, I don't have to wear one, right?"

I giggled. "No, Mac." He still had some stuff to learn. "But you do have to wear a suit."

"Okay, if you need me, I'll be in the bathroom, probably banging my head off the sink."

I smirked. "I'd rather wear a suit over a dress."

Mac sighed. "So, do you have one?"

Shook my head. I never owned one, and I never intended on owning one. But this dinner was one I had to attend, in order to get some more information for the show; it was also a chance to see if we could get some extra funds to keep expanding from President Nathan Rose himself.

"Well, we're going to the mall tonight anyway. Might as well pick up a dress then."

I rolled my eyes. "I hate dresses. And wait, when did we decide on that?"

"When you were half asleep on the couch."

I smiled at Mac. "Okay, fine. But don't be surprised if we end up with a bill for replacing or cleaning a store's carpeting."

"Why?"

I tossed my empty cup into the garbage can, letting it bounce off the rim a couple times before it clunked off the other garbage. "Because I might throw up."

...

I. Hate. Dresses.

Well, I should say I hated them. I didn't own any; and I didn't own any skirts either. I just hated them.

And I was pretty sure I was gonna ignite the thing after the dinner and let it burn.

Mac smirked. "I thought you hated these."

"I do," I muttered, trying to avoid touching the dresses on the racks. I wasn't looking for anything extravagant; I just wanted something that was good enough for a dinner with the president and a bunch of other people of importance. Finally, I dared to touch one of the dresses and as soon as my fingertips touched the fabric, I dropped it. The fabric was itchy, and there was no way I was wearing it.

"So nothing too dressy…" Mac smiled and blushed. "I have no idea what that means as far as dresses go."

I grinned. "Just no red." All the dresses that were red looked a little weird; some looked like they were the color of blood mixed with puke.

So no red.

I sighed again and tried another section. I glanced up and saw McKian standing by me, holding four dresses. He shouldn't have been able to... "How in the world-"

"No red in here," Mac said, handing them to me. "I think you might like a couple of them." He shrugged and looked around. "Okay, now where are you supposed to try these on again?"

…

First dress. Green with a yellow belt. It looked okay, and it was even my size, and I hadn't expected McKian to know my dress size. But the seams weren't right.

Second one. Purple. I smiled as I saw it matched my hair; no wonder he'd picked this one. And, dear Lord I hated to admit it, but it wasn't half bad. My brown cargo jacket could easily go over this one.

Third dress. Another green one, except it was blue-green, and very pale. I liked it, but it had a rip in the side. This one was out too.

Surprisingly, I'd liked all the dresses this far. I have never liked one before. McKian really knew what I liked. I was shocked.

The last one made me smile. This one was grey, a charcoal color, with purple and pink. It wasn't really a formal dress, mainly because it was a mix of plaid and jean material. The skirt came just above my knee and I grinned. I was buying this one, and the purple one.

And maybe I wouldn't burn them. Yet, that is...

…

"I don't know about this."

Mac's laughter echoed, coming right through my bedroom door. "Knight's not here. We're fine."

Yeah, not what I was worried about.

I took a deep breath and got my shaking fingers under control enough to open the door. I didn't even bother looking up at McKian as I walked over to the couch where he was with the bunnies; for some reason, I expected him to burst out laughing as soon as he saw me.

But when I didn't hear that, I had to look up, brushing my hair out of my eyes. I was silent too, seeing his amazed expression.

"Wow…" was all Mac got out at first. He smiled and I felt my face get hotter as I smiled too and he started looking more closely at the dress, once, then twice, and then he looked me over a third time. This was the purple one, and I kept running my hands over the smooth fabric, my gloved palms not feeling the fabric, but my fingertips brushing over it.

I ran my fingers over the bottom of it; it was shorter than the grey and pink one, stopping about three inches above my knee. But it was the more formal of the two by far. "Do you think-"

"You look amazing," Mac answered before I could finish, standing up and pulling me against him. I stared up into his green eyes and felt more blood rush to my cheeks as he looked me over again. "This one. Definitely this one."

I smiled up at him. "You need to shrink."

"You need to grow," he joked, resting his chin on my head as I fell against his chest. "So, you wearing the cargo jacket over this?"

"Yeah." I didn't say anything else, just grinned as he held me. The room felt like it was filled with light, like every single stinking care and problem and shattered memory from my past had vanished. After being surrounded by hate and darkness for years, this moment was the best one in my life yet.

Mac rubbed my back, the seams on his black gloves hitting the area of my back where the dress was open. Another reason to wear a coat over it- I had a lot of scars. "You're so beautiful." I could feel my cheeks turn bright red as he kept rubbing his fingers over my bare back.

I smiled and pressed my face deeper into his chest. He was always so caring and kind. I just wished that everyone back on the Grid could see that.

"I love you."

I glanced up at him; his eyes were closed. "I love you, too." Never wanted to let go of him. Not now, not ever.

* * *

There was a reason why I let Knight handle our finances. That was mainly because staring at the numbers (and our electric bill) made my head throb to the point where I was sure my brain would explode.

We still had quite a bit to work with, it you considered over two million dollars a lot. With the donations from people coming to be in the audience, we'd gained another three thundered thousand; and a few organizations had backed us from the start.

But math was not my speciality. Knight could have the bills when he got back.

McKian hugged me from behind and kissed my cheek. "I thought you hated bills."

"I do." I grabbed his arms and laughed as he kissed me again. "You ready for tonight?"

Mac nodded. "Yep." He pulled me off the kitchen chair and spun me around; I wrapped my arms around his neck my feet dangling above the floor. "You wearing a t-shirt and shorts to go?"

I smirked. "Yeah, that's exactly what you wear to be around the president," I shot back, my voice dripping with sarcasm.

Mac grinned and set me down. As he did, my pink socks slipped on the floor as I tried to regain my balance on the spot where it switched from tile and wood flooring to carpet. I fell to the floor and gasped closing my eyes. Heard a loud thunk and looked up.

McKian was only inches from my face; he was on top of me, his knees on either side of my knees and his arms up behind my head. "Hello."

"You falling for me or something?" I asked, laughing as his light cheeks faded into pink and then deep red.

"Maybe." He pressed his nose against mine. "You know you're on the floor, right?"

My turn to blush "You know you're on top of me, right?"

Mac laughed and kissed my cheeks. "Mine."

I smiled and pressed my lips against his forehead, finally grasping just how much taller he was than me; his body could easily cover mine.

Before I could move, Mac had his hand on my side and started tickling me. I laughed and tried to tickle him back, but he used his other arm to hold mine down. I kept laughing, finding it harder to catch my breath, but not caring too much. It seemed like he did, though, because he stopped and suddenly he was holding me on his lap on the couch as I gasped and refilled my lungs.

"Sorry. Did I hurt you?" Mac looked like he was going to burst into tears.

I shook my head. "No, I'm fine." He still freaked out about little things like this.

Time to get jittery McKian to relax.

…

"What are you doing?"

I watched, trying not to laugh just yet as McKian put down his chicken sandwich. "I'm stuffing my face with a chicken sandwich. What does it look like?"

I laughed. "You're doing great." He was doing really well with speaking now, especially considering we were in the middle of Wendy's and he usually got nervous in public.

Mac shrugged. "Thanks. I still slip up a lot though." Modest McKian. I was ready to punch him.

"Everyone slips up, Mac. It's okay," I tried to encourage him. "So, just be careful tonight, okay?"

Mac nodded. "Yeah. Just promise me you won't end up getting injured."

I smirked, trying to hide the feeling that was building up in my gut that something was gonna go wrong.

So, no promises there.


	27. Chapter 26

**PART FOUR: READY OR NOT**

**"I pledge allegiance to being somebody real. There's no more holding it back- I'm showing 'em how I feel…" -Britt Nicole & Lecrae**

* * *

(Skigh's POV)

I looked around at all the elegant and extravagant pieces decorating God only rooms what room. There were large marble pillars reaching up to touch the cloud white ceiling; purple curtains brushed off the floor and tapped the spotless windows as the faint drafts from the vents pushed them. Lots of antique vases held flowers and I stayed away from some of them, the inhaler in my coat pocket seeming to become an anvil.

It was beautiful, but not my style.

And this was just from walking through the dozens of doors leading to the room. McKian kept shifting his gaze from object to object, his watch screen blazing as he identified the people already present and those entering behind us.

I noticed the president surrounded by his security, and he looked just as relaxed as always. His dark hair was slicked back, his blue eyes twinkling and his tall frame covered in another black suit.

Classic Nathan Rose.

"Okay, this place is huge," Mac whispered by my ear, tugging on his green striped tie. "And I hate this thing."

I had to admit that he looked pretty good in that suit; the black and green kinda matched his suit on the Grid. But, as usual, his hair stuck in a million directions. Maybe he needed a hair cut or something in the near, or distant future; I really didn't care. "You look good in that suit."

Mac grinned. "Thanks. But nowhere near as good as you," he said softly right by my ear as he put his arm around me.

I looked away from him. This was the first time I was wearing a dress since the nightmare that stretched itself over the first fourteen years of my life. I hadn't had any flashbacks yet in the thing, so… so far, so good. Now I just had to worry about some crazy terrorist trying to kill the president. I really didn't feel like jumping in front of any bullets tonight. I didn't really have any intention of becoming a bodyguard in a matter of seconds.

"Where are we supposed to sit?"

As we passed through another set of massive doors surrounded by guards, I stared at the table in awe. The thing was huge, made of some expensive wood that I couldn't even begin to guess the name of, and draped in purple. It was probably over thirty feet in length. I shrugged and glanced at the far end, the opposite of where the president was going to sit (yeah, a chair surrounded by guards… what are the odds it's someone else's?) and pointed. "Down there. Let's avoid everyone for a little while," I hissed the last part, a little annoyed that everyone was already dividing into their upper class groups and cliques. As we sat in the older, probably high-priced chairs, I sighed and watched as the others at the table tried sitting up by the guards. Since there were no spots that said you were supposed to sit here or there, many people were just trying to get close to the president... and then getting ushered away by security.

Not us.

"We're alone down here," Mac said with a smirk, patting my leg under the table. "It's kind of nice down here."

I nodded and leaned back in my chair, not caring too much about anyone else's thoughts. I ran my hands over the arms of the chair and smiled. Probably a mahogany stain on these-

"Oh, look who it is."

I looked up at the sneering voice and tilted my head. "Do I know you?" Probably not, but that tone made me a little on edge.

A woman with a low-cut blue dress (not a good shade of blue to match her overly tanned skin, and not good as far as the low-cut part) with her blonde hair (really bad dye job) pulled up tightly in a bun crossed her arms. "No, but everyone here knows you. And you really don't seem to fit in here. I don't know what the president was thinking when he invited scrawny, little you here."

I kept up a poker face as she continued to rip me apart. When she finally stopped for a breath, I just looked up at her and said, "Well, I'm fine, ma'am, thanks for asking. And how about you?" Being polite, not sarcastic... but sarcasm was definitely on it's way if she kept going; at this rate, both of her feet would be in her mouth and so far down her throat that they'd never come back up.

"You little snip," she hissed. "I can't believe the president would be so stupid as to allow such an atrocity in this beautiful building."

I shrugged. "Well, I could say the same for your language from just moments ago." Seriously, I hadn't heard stuff that bad come pouring out of someone's mouth in years, not since the orphanage.

"And your friend here…" she pointed her hand at McKian, then pulled her hand back against her chest as if being so close to him would cause her finger to fall off. "What gutter did you crawl out of? I've seen those tattoos of yours."

I glanced at Mac as he just shifted in his chair; he was trying to turn the other cheek like I had, but it was definitely going to be harder for him, given the fact that he wasn't quite normal.

"Well, can't you speak? Or are you too much of an invalid to use that mouth of yours?" The woman's laughter reminded me of a hyena. The death look in her eyes seemed to spread throughout her body.

"I can speak. I just like to think before I do," McKian responded, placing his folded hands on his knee, perfectly calm.

The woman gasped. "Well, the nerve of YOU!" She stormed off , the heel on her shoes giving her a little trouble as her left leg twisted beneath her.

I smirked. "Nice one. I'll have to remember that."

Mac smiled. "Well, it was just the truth." He took my hands in his and laughed. "You weren't so bad yourself there."

"Thanks." I glanced at the woman as she slipped again, pushing people out of her way.

"Skigh?"

I turned back to McKian. "Yeah?"

He glanced around, then motioned with his hand to his eyes. "They're glowing again."

I noticed his were glowing too. It was a little weird, knowing that my eyes were lit up. But it was kinda cool, too.

"Skigh?"

I jumped and looked up in shock. "Mr. President." I stood up and so did McKian, Mac standing taller than the president.

Nathan Rose smiled. "I'm glad you two could make it, especially after your little accident a month ago." He stopped for a second before asking, "How are you doing after that anyway?"

"Actually, I've been doing better than I have in a longer time," I answered, quickly chancing a glance at Mac.

"That's good to hear," Nathan nodded, his deep voice not intimidating like it was in his speeches. "Now, what's this about calling me 'Mister President?'"

"Sorry, sir." I wondered if that was what he wanted to be called

Nathan rolled his eyes and grinned. "And no 'sir' either. I'm Nathan to you two. Now," he glanced around. "What are you two doing all the way down here?"

I frowned. "What do you mean?"

Nathan laughed, looking over his shoulder. For a guy in his forties, he definitely didn't look like he was a day over thirty. "You two are supposed to be sitting up by me, actually. I can't believe how many people keep trying to take those seats." He put an arm around me and one around McKian; Mac seemed a little tense, nervous around our nation's leader as we started walking towards the head of the table. "This one woman insists that she's supposed to sit up here. I think I might have to have her removed."

I bit my lip, trying not to smirk, as I formed a hunch as to who he meant.

…

"It's nice out here."

Wherever we were, the garden stretching out around the building was huge, and definitely well kept. Every flower looked perfect, I didn't see any weeds, and it looked like paradise. The stars overhead twinkled and reflected off the massive ponds on either side of us. A faint glow emanated from the city lights in the distance.

Mac started rubbing one of the flower's petals between his fingers, the pink of the petal coming off on his hand. "How much does this cost?"

"I don't know, but what I do know is that Nathan agreed to provide us with some funds, and interviews on the show." That was good news for the show, and most of his money coming our way was going to charities anyway.

"That's good." Mac kissed my forehead and hugged me. "How come we're the only ones out here?" He kissed the top of my head and ran his huge hand through my hair.

I sighed. "That's because everyone else wants to talk about money and how much they're worth. At least we're alone out here."

Mac grinned, his eyes glowing again. "Not again…"

I laughed. "Again." Our eyes were glowing for the second time tonight. I grinned up at McKian. "Pretty good night, huh?"

Mac grinned back and nodded. "Mine." My feet left the ground as he spun me around, the green shrubs and flowing fountains swirling into a mix of beautiful colors.

I grinned up at him as he set me down. He lifted me in his arms and I kissed his cheek, then rested my head on his shoulder. "Mine."

…

"Uh, Skigh?"

I picked RAM up off the counter and smiled at her, not noticing the tension and nervousness in Knight's voice. "Yeah?"

"You, uh… you might want to see this."

That did not sound good. Still tired from the night before (I had driven four hours from Washington D.C. at eleven at night, and getting only three hours of sleep wasn't cutting it), I felt my jaw clench as I walked out of the kitchen and stepped around the small wall housing the TV and gasped.

"… right. This picture went viral last night after a photographer decided to snap a couple of pictures," the female reporter's voice was the only sound, but the pictures said it all.

It was me and Mac in the garden behind the building, wherever it was in Washington D.C., and it was of me kissing him. Another picture appeared, this one of him spinning me around. "Skigh and McKian are trending on Twitter and have been since midnight. Whether they are dating or not still remains a mystery, as the duo has yet to respond…"

I blocked out her sticky-sweet voice and flopped down on the couch. "How in the world did this-"

"What's going on?"

I looked up at McKian as he stepped out of his and Knight's room, not even wearing a shirt because it was so early. "I think you can guess," I muttered, a little worried about Alex's reaction, even if now he liked McKian. Glancing up at his towering frame again, I noticed for the first time that Mac had a six pack; his arms were starting to build up with more muscle, and his tattoos were darker than ever.

Mac sat next to me. "I'm so sorry. I never thought they'd-"

"It's not your fault," I cut him off and rubbed his back encouragingly. He paled, and with my hand pressed against his bare back, I felt his skin turn to ice. "It'll be fine."

"Yeah, once you get a shirt on."

The three of us looked up and, I sighed in relief as Alan leaned on the doorway, staring down at Jump Drive as J. D. tugged on one of his shoelaces and started untying his left leather shoe. He looked up and smirked. "Man, I leave for a few days and all this happens!"

Mac threw his head in his hands. "All I've ever been is trouble for you. I mean seriously!" He grabbed the remote off the table and unmuted the TV.

"… Alex Ryker has responded to the trending photos, saying that he had no idea that anything like this was happening, but-"

He slammed his chalk-white finger into the "mute" button and threw the remote onto the couch; I winced as it bounced off and clattered to the floor. "I never do anything right!" Mac sighed and his breath became uneven. "You never should have-"

"You say one more word and I'll have Tron smack you upside the head," I threatened, then toned down my voice before continuing. "That is a lie, McKian. You do a ton of stuff right, but people, and programs, just never get the chance to see it. And when they do, they don't recognize it. But you don't mess up. You help people. Come on, you saved Beck."

Mac shrugged. "I got lucky," he whispered into his palms.

"You kicked Pavel's butt."

He didn't say anything this time, but his breathing evened out a little.

"You saved Ian the first time you saw him from getting shot." I had a few more left, but only one was going to make him feel better. "You saved me."

He finally looked up at me, his green eyes starting to ignite. "Yeah, but that…" he stopped and drew in a shaky breath; I felt his ribs shake under my hand on his back.

I smiled at him. "You are capable of so much. You can do things that I'm pretty sure even Kevin Flynn couldn't when he created the Grid in the first place. You are not a screw up, and you do not screw up. Yeah, everyone makes mistakes, but those pictures are not a mistake." I nodded at Knight as he picked up the remote and unmuted the TV.

The same reporter was still drawling her words out. "Alex Ryker has just answered one of our calls, saying that he doesn't mind if his sister and McKian Karson are dating. Again, we're not sure if they are or not, but the photos suggest that they are. His wife Griffyn also commented, saying that she's happy for them, and her father Ian, now working with Fox, has agreed with his daughter on the su-"

"See?" I grabbed his huge hand and pressed my small one into it. I felt his cold skin thaw as soon as my skin connected with his. "Not a mistake."

A small smile appeared on his face. "Okay… I guess you're right."

Alan finally spoke up again. "Can I cut in here for a second?"

I shrugged. "Sure."

"McKian, I know it's May, and it's seventy degrees outside at seven in the morning, but you're shivering. I think you need to put on a shirt." Alan grinned.

After a few minutes, Mac and Knight left and Alan sat beside me on the couch, trying to pry J. D. from his shoe lace. As soon as he did, RAM grabbed the other one. "Oh, for the love of…" he shook his head. "Really? You too?"

"You have tasty shoelaces." I laughed as he finally got RAM off his foot.

Alan sighed and stared at me, his smile disappearing. "Did… did you say 'Tron' earlier?"

I nodded. "Yeah."

"How in the world-"

"You are going to think I've lost my mind if I even begin to explain it," I tried to caution him, holding up my hands.

Alan laughed. "Believe me, with the stuff I've heard in my life, I won't."

I took a deep breath. "I warned you…"


	28. Chapter 27

(Skigh's POV)

**"I found myself looking into the mirror- knew I wasn't who I wanted to be. I was living life the way that I wanted, but my eyes reminded me I'm not free. Believed a lie so everything that I know says I gotta go, tired of going solo. But I'm never gonna go there again…"**

I smiled and stretched out on the floor in Tron's hideout, laughing as J. D. and RAM raced across the slippery floor, their paws stretching out as they slid across the floor. Mac had generated something that resembled an iPod and that worked like an iPod; after licking it, the rabbits had lost interest in the itty bitty device and I synced it with Tron's computer.

**"This is what it is, this is who I am. This is where I finally take my stand. I didn't wanna fall, but I don't have to crawl- I met the one with two scarred hands…"**

RAM came flying across the floor, her purple paws hitting the floor repeatedly as she tried to stop. I grabbed her up and tickled her ears, her trembling little body starting to relax.

**"I see you're walking like you're living in fear- having trouble even looking at me. Wishing they would give you more than words- sick of people telling how it should be. What'd ya download? Where'd you get your info? You saw their hype show, now you're in the in know- I'm gonna tell you what I believe…"**

And then Jump Drive slid into my leg. "Okay, squirmies," I giggled, cradling both bunnies as their noses twitched. "Let's be careful, okay?" I sat them down and they just flopped on the floor, tired. "Or let's be tired." They snuggled against each other and fell asleep, becoming a cute little ball of black, blue, white and purple.

I turned off the music and removed the iPod thingy from the system. Being here alone…

This place was too big.

With Tron, Beck and Mac out gathering intel, I was a little jumpy being on my own here; every word echoed, as did every step.

And it freaked me out.

As I pulled the device from the computer's mainframe, I gasped. Sparks flew out from the invisible screen, crawling up my fingers and causing me to scream. The blue lighting kept inching up me, and I felt tears pour down my face without my permission as I fell to my knees. I started praying as I dared to open my eyes and made out blue cracks racing up the black of my suit and cracking open and apart my hand.

"Please," I gasped, sending every ounce of my draining strength into praying for a miracle. I collapsed and fought to breathe, lying on the floor, unable to move.

* * *

"Ow…"

I opened my eyes and gasped, sitting up. My hand was fine. The lightning was gone.

I stood up, no pain radiating through me this time. I saw Jump Drive tackling RAM; at least they weren't effected.

A strange, murky glow pulsed behind me, lighting up the floor. I turned around and stared in horror.

In a mix of sickly orange and blue, covering the windows of the hideout, was code that made me shiver. The code twisted into four words that made my stomach churn.

**Let the games begin.**

I glared at the letters and sighed.

"What happened?"

Spun around as Beck rushed in, his mask gone, finally. "Oh great."

Tron came in behind him, his unmasked face making me cringe. "How did this happen?"

"I think a system was overloaded. I got shocked and passed out." I watched as he rushed put the windows and ran his hands over the code, pulling a chunk of it from the window. "Where's Mac?"

Beck's brown eyes went wide. "He was right behind us."

I frowned and rushed down the stairs, grabbing a baton on my way out of the lair. Wherever Mac was, something wasn't right.

...

"Oh, God no."

I derezzed the blue and black bike and ran, not caring if I overexerted this time. I had ridden out into the outlands; I knew this was quite a distance from Argon.

McKian was laying on the ground, unconscious; little sparks were dancing around his fingers. I rolled him off his stomach and onto his back. He wasn't injured, but he wasn't moving either. "Mac?"

He groaned, but didn't do anything else. I sighed and brushed his long hair out of his eyes. "Come on, McKian, please wake up."

Groaned again. I took a deep breath and, knowing this was probably not gonna help my health any, I gently grabbed him and pulled him up, then rezzed up my light cycle.

This was not going to be an easy ride, and I really wanted to know what had happened to him. For all I knew, his watch decided to upgrade itself and he'd just passed out.

Or maybe Cyrus had something to do with it.

…

As I got closer to Tron's hide out, I saw someone pacing around at the base of the mountain. I glared, recognizing the mess of tangled circuits spilling onto his face making him instantly recognizable.

"Cyrus…"

I jumped and slowly applied the brakes as McKian woke up; he pushed himself up off my back and groaned. "Not this jerk again…"

He didn't sound too good. "Are you alright?"

"I don't know, but in a moment Cyrus won't be." He jumped off the back of the light bike and I derezzed it, following him as he walked up to Cyrus to confront him.

This could be bad.

* * *

_-Lyrics from Newsboys "Born Again"_

_Thanks for all the reviews, guys! knowing what you think really helps a lot :)_


	29. Chapter 28

(Mac's POV)

"Well, well, well..." Cyrus smirked and crossed his arms. "Looks like the misfit woke up."

I glared at him as his eyes narrowed towards Skigh. "You have pretty decent aim with a disc, I'll give you that much. But being a user," he snarled, "makes you that much easier to beat."

"Oh, spare me." Skigh shook her head. "You have no idea who you're up against." I slowly stepped towards Cyrus as Skigh distracted him.

Cyrus tilted his head as I inched closer. "And just who am I up against? Misled, stupid, idiotic opponents? Rivals that will lead to the destruction of the Grid?"

"Gee, I thought that was you," Skigh said, shrugging. "I don't remember Tron ever building a doomsday device or killing innocent programs or framing the Renegade-"

"You are WRONG!" Cyrus drew his disc and I tapped my watch, praying that it would work like it had last time.

And my prayers were answered in the affirmative.

Blue-green glowing sparks shot from my hands, the lightning pouring from them catching Cyrus in the chest. He dropped his disc and screamed as he fell to his knees. I could feel my energy draining again, the same as last time just a little while ago, as Cyrus continued to scream. I finally had to stop, and Cyrus, his own energy drained from me shocking him, grabbed his disc and ran. "I WILL BE BACK!" he screamed and I would have rolled my eyes if I had the strength left to.

"What was that?" Skigh ran over to me as I fell to my knees, too weak to stand.

I took a deep breath and tried to stop shaking. "Another new ability," was all I could get out before falling on my back.

"Are you gonna be okay?"

I nodded as Skigh helped me to stand. "Cyrus won't be gone long."

"I know." Skigh shook her head as he disappeared. "Let's hope Beck and Tron will be ready.

* * *

"Come on, Beck." Tron shook his head. "Where is he? Cyrus hasn't been around here lately at all. He should be here."

I glanced at where Skigh lay on the floor, a pink glowing blanket draped over her. RAM sat on her arm, and Jump Drive was tucked under her arm, rubbing his head against her neck. "Should I go look?"

Tron turned around and removed his disc, changing his suit to the black one with few circuits. "I'm coming with you. I don't know," his voice became distorted as hit helmet and mask slid over his face, "if your friend should come though."

"She's the one who put a disc in Cyrus before. She should probably come." I gently shook Skigh awake and put Jump Drive and RAM into their little glowing cage. Thankfully, Tron had made the walls higher… again.

Skigh yawned. "What happened?"

"Time to go find Beck."

…

"Here it is."

The three of us stood outside the edge of the crater that used to house Cyrus's prison. Without the swirling energy pool over it, the shards of his former jail lay scattered across the ground.

Skigh, being the most adventurous, slid down the edge of the crater and knelt by the pieces. I followed right behind her. "How in the world did he survive this?"

I shrugged. "He's a lunatic. I think Dimwit may have reinforced his codes or something."

"What do you mean?"

I'd forgotten about Tron being with us. I looked up at him. "Beck thought Cyrus was dead, and I would have, too." I picked up a piece of the prison and tapped my watch. "I have to admit that Cyrus created a pretty impressive doomsday device."

Skigh nodded. "Yeah. It was more impressive that Beck managed to destroy it.

"What are you tailing about?" Tron crossed his arms, staring down at us.

"Beck didn't tell you?"

Tron shook his head. "No…" As I looked at him, I partially expected the scar that ran up his neck to still be there, momentarily forgetting he'd been healed.

I sighed. "Beck accidentally met Cyrus. Cyrus strapped him to the device that was supposed to destroy the Grid and Beck broke free, causing the device to self-destruct and Cyrus got caught in the middle of the self destruction. And Beck thought Cyrus died." Yeah, I'd left out quite a bit, but for the sake of time.

"He didn't know he was free?"

"No," Skigh answered glaring at him. "He stopped the Grid from getting destroyed and finds out you lied to him… and you just expect him to be fine with that?!"

Tron pointed to my watch. "It's flashing."

Skigh rolled her eyes as I checked my watch to get the readings on the prison. "Don't change the subject! He deserved the truth, maybe not right off, but before he nearly killed himself fighting Cyrus the first time."

Tron didn't respond, just stared at my watch as I tapped the screen.

"You never knew about this?" Skigh asked him.

Tron shook his head. "No, because he never mentioned it."

"Oh, he did. But you never took the hint. And you seriously expect him to tell you about one of the worst cycles of his life? He doesn't even know the full extent of what happened to you."

I frowned. "Definitely reinforced coding."

"The prison?" Tron kept staring at the watch.

"No, Cyrus. He's practically impossible to kill." I sighed. "This means that he'd either need to be fully drained of his energy or get blown up."

Skigh shook her head. "Great…"

Tron sighed, too. "So, you're saying that Beck had every right to never mention this incident?"

"To be fair, you never brought up word one about the first renegade losing his mind."

I bit my lip to kept from smirking. Skigh was right.

Tron sighed again, his dark helmet sliding away. "So, any ideas where Cyrus would go?"

Skigh nodded, much to my surprise. "Yeah, actually I do."


	30. Chapter 29

(Skigh's POV)

"If Dimwit was still alive…" McKian punched the top of his light cycle. "That jerk!"

I focused on the road ahead of us, trying to forget about Dimwit. Not like I cared about him; I didn't really feel much for him, except I had some sympathy for his twisted, sadistic mind. (I am by no means perfect, but compared to Dimwit, I probably looked like a saint or something.)

The guy had created a program who was just as evil, idiotic (and let's just end the list there because I could describe him in many various ways.) And, because he wanted power, ended up falling to his death.

"I could've saved him," I muttered, feeling my body tingle as my arms became numb; it felt like Dimwit's weight was attached to them again as he hung in my grasp, screaming, and the building exploding.

Tron, riding just slightly behind us, frowned as his mask slid into place.

I was really hoping my hunch had paid off. Anything Dimwit created had two options: be drastically altered-

or be destroyed.

And, sadly, Cyrus wasn't giving us much, if any, of a choice.

* * *

"So, you gave me an answer sooner than I expected."

I gritted my teeth as Cyrus's sickening voice echoed over the docks. My hunch was right; he was here.

I had no proof he'd be here, no way of knowing he'd been here and…

here we were, listening to his voice and I was trying not to puke. But as soon as I saw him, maybe I could just barf on him. Now that didn't sound like that bad of an idea… did it?

Tron's mask slipped back into place as we stopped creeping up the stairway leading to the top of the crane, Cyrus's voice bouncing off the darkness and the crates and the machinery again. "So, you chose your life over your friends…"

"How predictable," I muttered, my voice in sync with his. But what was he talking about? Knowing how his whacko creator thought, I concluded that he probably threatened someone (odds, unfortunately, in Beck's favor) with either hurting their friends, or hurting them.

Someone said something, but I couldn't tell what. All I knew was Tron had pushed past us on the stairs, his dark suit blending camouflaged with the darkness around us. He drew his disc, but didn't activate the blaring outer rim; he just kept walking up the stairs, his breathing sounding like a continuous growl. It kinda resembled how I felt at the moment, minus the whole "I'm-ready-to-choke-that-jerk" bit.

"And your friends… they think of you as the bad guy," Cyrus drawled, his voice dripping with evil and hatred. My stomach started tying itself in knots as he continued. "Beck's never at work. Beck's never around. Beck's late." He stopped and laughed. "But me… I still don't particularly care for that Zed fellow, but Mara still-"

"You've got what you want already!" Beck shouted. His voice sounded hoarse, like he'd been screaming.

Not good.

"And that user who you know… I'd really like to get to know her better."

I rolled my eyes. "And my fist would really like to get to know your face better. Shut up," I muttered.

Cyrus's evil cackling echoed again. "You couldn't even punch me and here she is, nearly slicing me in two with her disc!" Now that was a lie on his part; Beck had punched him before.

And pretty soon, I would be too.

"But everything's already been set up. Everything's pre-determined. Everything is programmed…" Cyrus kept talking. "And even this was."

"You're crazy." Beck's voice was giving out; he sounded like he was in pain. The last thing I needed at the moment was McKian deciding to practically remove his own arm to save Beck again.

The three of us froze was a loud smack echoed, followed by a groan. I winced, the nervousness building up in my gut; it didn't take Einstein to figure out who was groaning in pain.

"Ha, everyone says that." Cyrus was speaking again, and my urge to knock him to Kingdom Come was back. "But I guess that no one recognizes genius."

Tron, already at the door to the crane, slammed his foot into the door and it went flying. "No, you just don't recognize insanity."

McKian and I followed Tron; the door's coding turned to cubes under our feet. Mac's watch glowed, as did the inside of the crane, and I stared in shock.

Cyrus had wires spilling from the controls of the crane, some connected with a big blue box of a bomb at his feet and…

the rest were wrapped around Beck.

I was glad Cyrus couldn't see my face behind the mask as I stared at Beck. Beck had been strapped down to the floor, his arms up over his head and the wires connected to the areas on his wrists that Cyrus had damaged the first time. His feet were held down to the floor as well, and I shivered as his face was distorted by pain.

"You're sadistic," I snarled at Cyrus as he knelt beside Beck, pressing the wires deeper against his arm and Beck struggled not to scream.

Cyrus smirked, temporarily looking away from Beck and releasing his arm. "Thank you."

I rolled my eyes under the mask. "Yeah, that's not a compliment." I drew my disc as he glanced down at Beck again and threw it, the white hot rim slicing his arm.

McKian and Tron did the same; Tron's disc cut into his leg; Mac's aggravated the injury I'd just given him. Cyrus just smirked and grabbed his disc.

I ducked and tackled him, his head cracking off the floor, right next to Beck. I punched Cyrus in the face and felt him go limp.

That wasn't going to last long.

McKian had already started untangling the wires from Beck's wrist, but not without Beck gritting his teeth and crying out in pain once or twice. He gasped as we freed his left hand, but couldn't fully disconnect the wires terrorizing his right one.

"One more move and he's dead." Cyrus jumped up before I could blink, his disc pressed against Beck's neck.

Mac and I froze; there was really no way to get Beck free without moving, and he didn't look too ecstatic about having Cyrus's disc ready to sink into his neck.

Thankful that I had a mask on, I glanced over at the control panel. Tron, trying not to move too much, was slowly undoing the wires that tied into the energy reserves for the docks and fueled the bomb. Behind his back, I could see several wires in his hands, more breaking off from the glowing blue panel as he kept removing them.

And then I noticed the silent sparks.

I felt my blood (or pixels, or whatever I was made up of now) turn to ice as I realized that if Tron undid all he wires, the bomb itself was still going to explode. And if we unhooked Beck from being it's primary fuel source, the bomb was still going off.

So we either let the docks blow up and take the Grid with it, or stop the bomb from reaching it's maximum power and blow up a crane, hopefully with none of us in it.

I took a deep breath and quickly grabbed my disc as Cyrus glanced at Tron. As he turned, I closed my eyes to avoid seeing the disc slice across his chest; again, I wasn't going to kill him, but injuring someone who believed in destroying everything I was okay with, under the circumstances.

Cyrus fell to the floor, murky orange-blue pixels spilling from his chest as he passed out. Quickly, Mac got the wires off Beck and gasped as they started sparking. "What is that?"

"Cy's backup plan. He's at least blowing up the crane. Just get Beck out of here!" As Tron and Mac picked up Beck, he groaned and his head fell forward as he passed out in their arms, several blue cracks I hadn't noticed before inching across his forehead, chest and arms.

I pushed Tron away from the panel and screamed again for them to get out of here. I yanked the last few wires from the crane, preventing the whole Grid from collapsing in on itself. I glanced over my shoulder to see them getting away on light jets.

At least they were safe.

God apparently still heard prayers from here. And, since he apparently also played a role in the stuff that happened here, I was hoping that jumping to the ground wasn't going to be as painful as being blown to bits along with a whacko psychopath. I ran to the door as the control panel started to spark, the half-powered bomb ready to detonate. I took a deep breath and before I could jump, the crane exploded.

The panel blew first, the debris flying and smacking themselves further as they hit Cyrus's body. At least if I was dying here, he was going with me. And at least I was ready if this really was the end, even if I wasn't ready for Alex to find out, not like I 'd ever be.

Something slammed into my back and I let go of the doorway.

It felt like I was falling for a while, and then the black I saw with my closed eyes turned into oblivion.


	31. Chapter 30

(Knight's POV)

"Knight?"

I jumped. "Yeah, who is-" I froze as I twisted to face the voice. "it?"

No, no, no, no, NO! This was not happening! This could not be happening!

Alex.

The guy who was supposed to be on vacation for another two weeks, who was supposed to be nasty, and had apparently had some epiphany.

Was someone who, by no means, could find out about Mac.

Was the guy who, right now, I needed to get out of here.

"Hi, Alex," I said, quickly trying to smile at him. I never was much of an actor, so this was definitely going to be a stupid learning experience that came at the wrong place and the wrong time.

Alex smiled. Yeah, definitely the wrong time. "Hi, Knight." His smile was unnatural.

So was his attitude, unnatural; his behavior, unnatural; his whole presence in the room was unnatural.

So, yep, back to the stupid learning experience.

"Where's Skigh?" Alex asked, sitting at the counter as I kept washing the stupid silverware. (No stupid plates- we ate on paper plates.)

"She's out getting stuff." That lame excuse sounded good enough to not get my head sliced off my Alex.

Alex nodded. "What about McKian?"

Time for another lame excuse. "He's taking the little rabbits to the vet."

"But they're digital… do digital bunnies go to a veterinarian?"

"Uh, well, the doctors kinda just lump them all together, and I… don't really know how it all works." I turned away form Alex back to the stupid and lame silverware and sighed. I was officially the stupidest, and lamest, liar in the world.

But Alex was buying it. "Okay."

"You're back early," I blurted out, eager to get him to stop thinking about Skigh and Mac.

Alex shrugged. "We're gonna head back out tomorrow. I forgot about a meeting with-"

"Oh, that sounds fun," I said, cutting him off. Yep, I was stupid alright.

Alex frowned. "Are you okay, Knight?"

"Who, me? Fine. Fine. I'm just fine. Nothing's wrong with me. I am perfectly fine." Oh, yeah, that didn't sound lame by any means.

Alex stood up. "Okay, then. I guess you're fine."

"Yep, I'm just fine." I bit my lip. Stupid…

"That's good. So, how have McKian and Knight been handling this whole relationship thing? They haven't-"

I cut him off, knowing exactly what he was getting at. "No, nothing like that. Neither of them have event thought of going that far this soon in their relationship. Mac's not like that, anyway." Seriously, the whole concept was the last thing on Mac's mind, mainly because he was still a little shaky on all the stupid details. And Skigh… Skigh wasn't that kind of girl by any means.

He smiled. "I've gotta head out, but tell Skigh and Mac I stopped by. And tell Skigh I love her, okay?"

I nodded. "I definitely will."

"What?" Alex turned as he walked out.

"Nothing. I just said I'd tell your sister you love her." Man, was I bad at this!

The unnatural feeling left the room and I finally relaxed. "You guys better get back soon."

Where were they?


	32. Chapter 31

(Mac's POV)

I sat on the stairs in Tron's hide out, glancing over my shoulder at Beck, who was leaning against one of the huge windows. He was still weak, but at least he was awake and I'd managed to repair the damage from Cyrus.

I stared at a fresh slit in my arm, this one crossing over the old one. The blue pixels were slowly filling up the gash again, and I wasn't in a lot of pain.

But Skigh wasn't here.

I glanced up over my shoulder at the cage where RAM and Jump Drive sat, waiting for her to come and pick them up. They seemed to know she hadn't come back.

I stood up and stormed down the stairs, not even bothering to mention to Tron that I'd left. He'd probably heard me leave.

There was no way Skigh was dead. My watch had a link with her coding- I would have been notified by now, mainly because if one of us died, both of us died.

Skigh was still out there.

I just didn't know where.

But I did have an idea as of where to start.

…

The docks were dark, completely empty. I was shocked. When the crane had exploded, there had been quite a crowd crammed around the crates and machinery.

But now there was nothing.

I stared at the charred remains of the crane as I circled the docks on my light jet for the sixth, or eighth (I'd lost track) time. As I landed, I saw the long wires from Cyrus's bomb, or what was left of them, hanging from the blown off top and I ran my hand through my hair, hoping and praying that God heard my prayers here and had a say on the Grid. (I already guessed that he did, but right now…) I tapped the watch screen and analyzed the coding.

Skigh hadn't been blown to bits.

I didn't even bother with checking for Cyrus. He wasn't of any importance to me. But, judging from the results of the scans, Skigh had defused a bomb designed to destroy the whole Grid and instead triggered the back-up that blew up the crane.

"Where are you?" I shouted, not caring if anyone heard me.

I was going to find her.

After everything we'd been through, I was not losing her now.

"SKIGH!" I screamed again, wishing the pounding in my head would stop.

…

I couldn't find her.

I searched everywhere at the docks, waiting for my watch to locate her. It still hadn't found her, and I'd looked everywhere.

She had to be somewhere.

Finally, the screen flashed. I gasped.

She was no where near the docks.

…

"God, no…" I let my light jet derezz and fell into the water.

I was somewhere out in the middle of the sea, far away from Argon. As I hit the cold water, I started swimming towards a black thing floating on the surface of the sea.

And if my watch was right, which it always was…

I gasped as I reached the floating piece that had been broken off a crane, and it looked like the door.

And my watch was right.

Skigh was laying on the door, her hands cracked open, the pixels showing under her skin. Various other cuts and slashes ripped open her very white skin. She was laying on her stomach, her hands curled around the door.

"Skigh?" I realized just how long she'd been gone, carried away into the sea with the rest of the debris from the explosion. For all I knew, she was ready to derezz. I gently shook her shoulder, then rolled her over as I pushed the floating door towards a nearby island. Her eyes were closed and she moaned as I turned her over. She had a lot of injuries, and the majority of them had a mix of blood and pixels pouring out of them. Her lip was sliced open, and well, that was probably the injury that I had to worry the least about.

As soon as we reached the island, I picked her up off the door and gently laid her down so I could attempt to repair her injuries.

And there were a lot of them.

…

I sighed and stared at the codes on her disc, shocked at how many codes were out of whack.

And, after staring at the codes and holograms for what seemed like forever, I looked up at Skigh, then gasped again. After repairing about two dozen of her major codes and systems, her hair had changed color again. This time it was grey at the ends, and the grey faded into blonde. There was an orange strip running down the left side of her head, and a blue one on the right. It didn't look bad. It looked pretty nice, actually, considering her hair was longer, reaching about halfway down her back.

It just shocked me.

Skigh groaned for the billionth time. I brushed some of her long hair out of her closed eyes and gently wiped some grit off her face, uncovering a whole new set of nicks, bruises and blood.

I glanced as something on one of the holograms from her disc started flashing.

This was going to take a while.

…

I fixed code after code after code- okay, I think you get it by now.

And I wasn't getting anywhere.

As soon as I repaired one, two more appeared that were damaged.

I sighed and threw my head in my hands, finally having to accept that Skigh might just end up derezzing right here, on this blasted rock in the middle of nowhere.

I'd tried everything.

I gently put her disc back and took her white little hand in mine, her skin lighter than mine. I bit my lip as her injuries got worse, the blue and bloody lines getting bigger and deeper.

Skigh moaned and started shaking. I grabbed her shoulders, trying to hold her still, hoping that if she stopped shaking, her injuries might not get worse.

But that wasn't helping.

I didn't want to lose Skigh, ever, and I never thought she was going to die this soon, especially here on the Grid.

I kissed her forehead and kept rubbing the back of her hand, staring at the massive blue and bloody holes in her black suit. I kissed her again and knelt beside her.

I ran my hands through her now really long hair, brushing every little bit of it out of her face. I pressed my hands against her forehead, feeling her skin get colder.

Everything started turning black, and this whole thing felt way too familiar. Last time it was…

Once again, this was an accident.

And it was happening again.

* * *

**"So, what do you think?"**

**I was seeing Skigh's memories again. But this time it wasn't little flashes of memory to match the conversation. I could actually see Skigh, and it looked like she was younger, about fourteen. Her hair wasn't colored. It wasn't even blonde. It was black, and her skin was very white, except for quite a few bruises and scars. She didn't have the gloves yet, and she was definitely shorter than she was now.**

**Skigh was looking around in shock. "This place is huge!" She spun around, then stopped. She looked nervous, and she was shaking. It looked like she wasn't sure if she was allowed to even walk on the glossy floor. The whole inside of the huge mountain house thing looked just like Tron's hideout, but there was a blue couch, a coffee table and a bookshelf.**

**Alex frowned. "You don't need to be scared here. I won't hurt you." He sounded nice.**

**Skigh didn't respond, just shook more. Her t-shirt and jeans were old and worn out. So were her sneakers.**

**Alex walked over to her and put his hand on her shoulder. "I promise, I'll never hurt you. You're my sister now, and I will make sure no one will ever hurt you again." He hugged her and Skigh slowly wrapped her tiny arms around Alex, crying.**

**She finally pulled away enough to look up at him. "Why-"**

**Alex smiled. "Come on." They walked down the reflective stairs and faced the set of different doors. He pointed out what each one was and finally walked up to the one and it opened. "Everything's high tech around here."**

**Skigh just nodded and shook more, still scared.**

**"This is your room." Alex pushed the door open and Skigh walked in behind him, staring in awe at how colorful it was. The walls were multi-colored, almost like a tie-dye shirt, and several colorful lights hung from the ceiling. A grey space near the back held a bathroom and a closet.**

**"This… is mine?" Skigh shook her head. "It's amazing, but I don't deser-"**

**Alex wrapped his arm around her small shoulders. "You definitely deserve it. If you want, you could rest for a little while and then we'll take a look at those bruises. They don't look so good."**

**Skigh, for the first time in this whole memory, smiled, and it seemed like the first time she'd smiled in a long time.**

**Skigh laid down on the bed and fell asleep instantly. She looked at ease as Alex smiled and gently pulled off her old shoes and covered her with a purple blanket, then quietly left. I noticed how everything in her original room was now in the new one at the auditorium.**

**And then, after a while, she woke up.**

**She sat on the edge of the bed for a little while, then stood up and fell to the floor. She sat up and rubbed her ankle, pulling off her old sock. A big black and yellow-blue mark covered most of her foot. Skigh quickly pulled on her sock and stood up, then stared at the door.**

**By the door, there was a pair of black hightop sneakers. She knelt down, wincing, and found a note shoved inside one of them. "'These are for you. I think they'll fit better than your old ones,'" Skigh mumbled, reading the note slowly, not being able to read it too well. She stared at the new shoes and poked them, scared. She slipped off her old shoes and put on the new ones. "They fit." She smiled. "My ankle doesn't hurt so bad either."**

**She walked into the bathroom and stared at the blue walls and tile. "Wow…"**

**Skigh turned and opened the grey steel closet doors. She gasped and tears filled her eyes. The closet was full of clothes, none of them dresses or skirts, and she found another note. "'These are your's too. I hope you like them.'" She stared at the note, reading it and rereading it several times.**

**"You can take whatever you want."**

**Skigh jumped and dropped the note, grabbing onto the door frame of the closet as Alex spoke. "Sorry," Alex smiled. "I didn't mean to scare you." He looked at her feet. "I see the shoes fit fine."**

**Skigh nodded and clung to the door frame. "Thank you," she said, her voice very quiet, much more nervous than it was now.**

**Alex slowly walked over to her and reached towards her. Skigh jumped backwards. Alex sighed. "I won't hurt you, I swear."**

**Skigh relaxed and let him hold her. Her ribs were easily seen through her shirt. She was underweight, and she didn't look good at all.**

**Alex sighed. "There's more in there," he said, motioning towards the bathroom door. "But, knowing that you-"**

**"Thank you." Skigh wrapped her arms around his neck as he lifted her. I was glad she'd cut him off, knowing what he was going to say. And she didn't seem like she wanted to be reminded of that particular injury.**

**"You really need to eat something." Alex looked shocked when he realized just how light she was.**

**Skigh shook her head. "I-I'm fine," she whispered, more tears rolling down her face and onto Alex's t-shirt.**

**Alex sighed again. "Skigh, listen to me. If you're hungry, just go grab something, anything. I'm not going to keep you from eating. And I know you're hungry right now, so don't lie to me, okay?"**

**Skigh nodded. "I'm sorry…" She cried again.**

**Alex bit his lip, and I knew why. He had somehow managed to get the thought into Skigh's head that he was going to get mad at her for that. "It's okay. Just relax. I'm not going to hurt you, and no one else will."**

**Skigh refused to let go of him. She slowly stopped crying and relaxed.**

* * *

I opened my eyes.

Everything was blurred, but that didn't matter. What did was the fact that I'd finally seen what Skigh had been like before.

And now I loved her more than ever.

Finally, my vision cleared and I was shocked.

Skigh was…

healed.

Every single injury was gone. There were no scars from the really bad wounds.

"How in the world did…" I rolled my eyes and stared at my watch, the blue screen fading.

So now I could break into Skigh's private thoughts, unintentionally.

And my healing powers had increased.

Skigh opened her eyes and sat up. "If this is Heaven, then it's really dark, and this cloud is rock hard."

I grinned. "Uh, no. It's the Grid, and that cloud is a rock island beneath you."

Skigh smirked. "Shouldn't I be dead?"

I sighed and helped her to stand up. "Yeah, about that…"

…

"So, you know."

I nodded.

"And you knew before… after REVOLUTION blew sky high?"

I nodded again.

"And you never said anything?"

I sighed and nodded again. I closed my eyes, waiting for Skigh to scream.

But I didn't hear anything.

Instead, Skigh hugged me.

I opened my eyes, shocked. "Okay, aren't you supposed to scream at me or something? I'm pretty sure your reaction isn't normal."

"Since when do either of us care about normal?" Skigh looked up at me. "I mean, seriously, we're standing on an island in the middle of nowhere, Tron probably has no idea where you are, and I'm pretty sure I'm supposed to be dead right now."

"So… you're not mad at me for never saying anything?"

Skigh shrugged. "I can't really blame you. And besides, I would think you'd hate me after seeing all that."

"Hate you?" Okay, where was that coming from?

"You'd be amazed…" Skigh sighed. "So, wait, you can heal injuries now?"

"Apparently." I smiled. "This just gets stranger and stranger."

Skigh laughed. "Yes, yes it does." She slowly let go of me and her long hair fell in her eyes. She brushed it out of her face. "What happened? My hair wasn't this long when the crane blew up."

I smiled. "Long story."

"Well, we have to get back to Tron, so I think we have enough time for you to tell me."

I sighed. "Fine. But I'd watch walking around with orange and blue in my hair."

"What?"


	33. Chapter 32

**PART FIVE: SPEED OF LOVE**

**"One track, one mind, one race to win- one start, one heart, one life to live…" -Owl City**

* * *

(Skigh's POV)

"What's he like?"

I stared at Griffyn in shock. "Okay, Griffyn, how much sugar did you put on your cereal this morning?"

Alex's wife laughed. "I can see why he likes you. You've got a good sense of humor."

I kept up my straight face. "Thanks, but seriously, are you feeling okay?"

Griffyn's brown eyes twinkled; she was up to something. "Skigh, come on. You're surrounded by guys twenty-four seven. Just tell me, okay?"

I crossed my arms on the other side of the dark red booth, my head hitting the wooden headrest behind me.

"Skigh, I promise I won't tell Alex… too much."

I rolled my eyes and grinned. "It's not that…" Seriously, she wasn't getting this.

And, honestly, she didn't need the details.

"How did you two meet?" Griffyn picked up a nacho chip and stuck it in the small red bowl of salsa.

Um… really should have seen that coming. "We sort of… ran into each other… unexpectedly." I hoped I was a good actor for this. Besides, I wasn't lying.

Griffyn nodded; she was convinced.

Good.

Question two came out of her mouth, and the almost swallowed chip and salsa nearly did as well. "What's he like?"

Okay, this she would probably tell Alex. But again, I had no reason to lie. "He's nice."

"Nice?" Griffyn almost choked on her iced tea. "Come on. Give me more adjectives."

I smirked. "Generous. Thoughtful. Caring. Considerate. Loving. Smart. Talented. Optimistic-"

"Okay, that's enough adjectives," Griffyn managed to get out as she laughed.

"You asked for it," I started laughing too.

Griffyn smiled. "He seems like a nice guy, but what's up with those tattoos?"

"What do you mean?" Um… not good.

"Well, not that I mean that in a bad way. It's just that those tattoos are a little out of the ordinary. How'd he get them?"

I stared into my Coke, half expecting an answer to float to the bubbly surface and clank around with the melting ice cubes. "You'd never believe me if I told you."

Griffyn frowned. "Why? I'll always believe you, Skigh."

I shook my head. "I think I shouldn't say. Mac likes to-"

"Keep that quiet," she finished, nodding in understanding. "Okay, I understand that. But what about him being… I don't know what the word is… discrete?"

I sipped my Coke and tried to keep my stomach from flying out from inside me. "He's just nervous around other people."

"But not around you, "Griffyn pointed out, grabbing another chip.

"He has good reason," I muttered.

"What?"

I froze, realizing she'd heard that. "Nothing."

"Have you two kissed yet?"

I quickly spat out the Coke I'd drank back into the glass. If everything else had been weird for Griffyn to say and do, then this was really out there. "I'm not sure I heard you right. Could you repeat that?"

Griffyn grinned. "Have you two kissed?"

I tried to stop the inevitable blush from spreading over my face. "Um, yes."

Griffyn's grin got wider, revealing her perfect white teeth. She was so nice, but this was a little out of the ordinary for her. "I'm not telling Alex."

"Okay, thanks." I relaxed and grabbed a chip, then stuck it in the guacamole.

"How many times?"

I'd lost count. "A few," I guessed at the amount and shrugged.

"You haven't ha-"

"Good God, no!" I didn't even want her to finish that sentence, knowing what was going to come spilling out of her mouth if I did. "I never even thought about that, Griffyn!"

Griffyn rolled her chocolate colored eyes. "Sure."

"I'm serious. I never thought about it, and I know that Mac hasn't either."

"How can you tell?" Griffyn tugged on her pink shirt collar and shook her head. "You're not inside his head, Skigh. For all you know-"

I flattened my hand on the table, furious that anyone would even begin to see McKian imagining that. "He is NOT like that. McKian is different than everyone else."

Griffyn shrugged. "Enlighten me."

"Enlighten you?" She had no clue how I could answer this and how fast her head would spin.

She nodded and crunched another chip.

Shifted in the seat. I needed to be comfortable for this. "Fine. McKian is not that kind of guy. He saved my life, several times I might add. And you, of all people, gave him some sort of a chance at first. You-" I pointed at her, not out of anger; I wasn't mad at her right to be curious; but I did it for emphasis "-can usually tell right off the bat whether you think someone's an angel or your worst nightmare." I took a deep breath. "You knew he was a good guy, I knew, Ian knew, and even good old Alan knew."

"Wait, Alan?" Griffyn frowned, her expression dripping with thought and concentration. "What in the world does he have to do with this?"

"You would not even believe me if I told you."

She smirked, jokingly saying, "Well, I could always ask Alan."

"He'd leave your head spinning with his explanation," I commented, wishing that we could get off this particular subject; my gut burned and I winced as my injury, or lack there of, took over my thoughts. I shivered.

Griffyn's voice sounded far away. "Are you-" She stopped and I looked up at her, the tears in my eyes making her a tan-brown-pink blur. "I forgot about that."

I nodded and felt her hand gently reach around mine. I flinched and tried to control my breathing.

"Skigh, I'm so sorry. I forgot that you-"

"It's okay." I smiled, wiping the tears from my eyes before they could fall onto my black shirt and grey shorts. "I'll just have to adopt a kid if I want one."

Griffyn smiled. "I think that you to are going to make a great couple."

I smirked. "A second ago, you thought we'd h-"

She laughed. "What? You have something against me protecting my adopted sister-in-law?" Griffyn's grin got wider. "I know you're not like that. I just-"

"Alex wanted you to ask."

"And that's it," Griffyn admitted, pointing at me. "Um, there's something else I need to tell you.

"What?" I stared at her and for the first time noticed how big her pink shirt was usually her shirts weren't ready to fall off her shoulders. And then I saw that the salsa and chips were completely gone. I stared at her in shock. "You're not… are you?"

Griffyn shrugged micheviously. "I'm five months along."

"Does Alex know?"

I gasped as she shook her head. "I'm holding off on that, mainly because we just redid the house and I don't want blood on the new floors."

"How would blood get on the floor from telling him?" I was confused, my head still reeling from the fact that my (I'm not too sure how we're related) sister-in-law was pregnant.

Griffyn giggled. "Because he'll probably hit his head on something like he does-"

"-every time he falls down," we finished in sync. I leaned on the table as the waiter brought over another plate of chips and salsa. As we continued talking, I started wondering how everything was going for McKian and Alex.

Maybe not a good idea to leave those two alone together.

* * *

…

* * *

(Mac's POV)

"When did you two start dating anyway?"

I cringed, wishing that Skigh was here. But it was time to see how independent I could be…

this should be interesting.

I took a deep breath and watched as Alex smiled, and it wasn't some weird smirk this time. "About three weeks ago."

Alex nodded. "You're scared of me."

"What gave you that idea?" I was already sitting against the back of the couch. If I could've gone farther back to avoid Alex's questions, I would have. Maybe I just would have avoided him completely.

"Why?"

I shrugged, trying to not look as nervous as I felt.

Alex sighed. "Look, I don't hate you. I never did. I just didn't understand you well enough then. Now I know more about you."

I was doubting he understood me at all.

"You and Skigh haven't had-"

I shook my head, trying to avoid him finishing that sentence. "No."

Alex frowned. "You were a little anxious to answer that."

"Look, I love Skigh, but I'm not ready for that." And that was the truth. I loved her a lot, with all my heart, but that was something that I was not ready for at all.

"Do you know about her injury?" Alex asked.

I nodded. "I've seen the reports on television."

"And you've never even thought of-"

"Alex, I love Skigh so much, but that thought never crossed my mind. I'm not like that, and I don't want that." At least not at this point in time I didn't. There was something in that little blue leather book that said not to go that far just yet… (I just hoped that Skigh's visit with Griffyn wasn't this awkward.)

Alex grinned, and I got even more nervous. "I really don't want you to think I'm a bad guy, okay? I really misjudged you at first, and I want to forget that and for us to be friends."

This did not sound like Alex. "Um… okay."

"And about what I said to you at the hospital before…"

"Forget it. " I sighed. "Believe me, I've heard worse."

Alex crossed his arms. "No one should have to hear anything like that."

"I agree. And that's why I'd never hurt Skigh."

Alex grinned. "I see that now." He stared at me. "Where'd you get that watch?"

I glanced down at it, trying to come up with a good answer. "A… friend." If my theory was right, then I did get it from a friend. A very good Friend.

"Must've been a really good friend. That thing looks expensive!" Alex smiled. "What does it do?"

Stop asking me questions already! God, help me! "Well, it… it tells time…and it… glows… and a bunch of other stuff that I can't keep straight."

Alex nodded. "Cool. Do you know where I could get one?"

Good luck with that. "Uh, no sorry. I don't know where it came from." Well, that was true. I only had a theory.

Alex leaned back and laughed as RAM hopped up onto the couch and hopped on his stomach. "There's another one."

I nodded. I waited for him to poke RAM the same way he'd poked Jump Drive.

But he didn't.

He picked up the rabbit and laughed more. "Where do you get these little creatures?"

I shrugged. "Uh, not too sure." Jump Drive hopped onto me and I grabbed him before he could hop onto the glass coffee table and slide off. "No, we don't need you getting hurt."

Alex looked at Jump Drive. "So, this one's a girl? The one I have?"

I nodded. "Yes. RAM's a girl, a very curious girl."

"Can they reproduce?"

Seriously? First Knight and now Alex? "No."

"So they've been to a vet and operated on?"

I shook my head, not really sure what he meant. "Uh, not exactly."

The whole idea of reproducing was something I didn't really want to think about, mainly because it freaked me out a little. It also scared me to think that Alex had considered me and Skigh… trying to, or whatever that was considered.

"Then how do you keep them from having more little rabbits?"

Alex was really scaring me now. "They just don't do that. They're only friends."

Alex nodded after my explanation. "Like you and Skigh are only friends."

I nodded too. But Skigh, from what I knew (directly from her and Knight), couldn't have… what was it called? A tiny user? A baby user?

I forgot.

I just wanted Skigh to get back so I could hopefully forget that part of my conversation with Alex.


	34. Chapter 33

(Skigh's POV)

"Was your conversation with Alex as awkward as mine with Griffyn?"

McKian slipped his arm around my shoulders and I leaned against him on the couch. "Uh, possibly even more awkward than yours."

I frowned and looked up at him as he blushed. "He didn't ask about-"

"He did." Mac nodded.

Rolled my eyes. "Something tells me there's more to it than that…" Knowing McKian, there had to be something else he was keeping tucked away in that labyrinth of a brain.

"We got into a conversation about Jump Drive and RAM reproducing."

Okay, that term was a little blunt, but Mac still had some vocab to get stuck in his noggin. "Hm… yeah, we didn't cover that at Red Robin." But seriously?

My brother thought that I would do something like that? I wasn't like that. In fact…

that whole idea kinda scared me.

McKian shivered. "Next time, we stick together."

"Deal. But it wasn't my idea!" I couldn't defend my brother or Griffyn for that whole two hours of awkwardness that was time I'd never get back and have carved into my mind forever.

Mac laughed. "I know." He rubbed my arm, his hand sliding up over my bare arm and his fingertips going under the strap of my green tank top on my shoulder; I snuggled against his chest and sighed, relaxed. "How are you not cold?"

I shrugged. My black shorts weren't covering too much of my leg, and I was a little chilly. "I guess I am," I admitted, feeling chills race through my limbs.

Closed my eyes and relaxed, just content to be near McKian. Without Knight around at the moment, and J. D. and RAM sleeping in my room, we had some peace.

Together.

I jumped as something warm fell over me, tickling my bare feet. Opened my eyes to see a small smile turning McKian's lips as he spread my purple blanket over both of us. "Is that better?"

* * *

"GET AWAY FROM ME!"

"Is that better, sweetie?"

"Calm down a little."

"This isn't going to hurt at all."

"I WANT MY MOMMY!"

"Honey, you have to take your medicine."

"I'm sorry, but your son didn't make it."

Sympathy.

Sadness.

Tears.

Pain.

Agony.

The hospital reeked of all of them.

Oh, and I left out death. But everyone already knew that, right?

The smell made me want to hurl; I was shocked by how many children were in this hospital. So many of them…

and so many would probably not make it out of here before they died.

Even just one child dying here was too many.

As I walked past another room, another sugar-sweet voice drifted out the door and only intensified the feeling of nausea building up in the back of my throat.

I sighed and squeezed McKian's hand harder. "This place…"

"I know." He sighed. "Um… the watch updated again."

I smirked. "What now? Shooting lasers out your eyes? Making the world's biggest ice cream sundae?"

"Mental link. I can control it mentally now."

Impressive. "How'd you find that out?"

"I created a smoke bomb and set it off. Don't worry- the living room won't smell like a bon-fire for long."

I laughed. "Can you control it?"

I stared up, craning my neck to see his expression as he smirked and nodded. "Yeah. Sorry about the living room."

"It's okay." I really hoped the room wouldn't smell too bad; I didn't feel like relying on my inhaler for everything; I'd already used the blasted thing twice in the last week.

"Wait, won't that hurt your… asthma? Is that right?"

"Yeah, that's right," I forced myself to admit. I didn't want him to feel bad for an accident. "But I'll be fine-"

McKian shook his head, his black-blue hair noticeably longer and falling in his eyes, completely covering them. "No, I don't want you having trouble and having to use that stupid little blue tube-thing," he whispered, his voice shaky. He was really concerned about me having any problems or discomfort at all.

One thing I loved about him.

We kept walking around, trying to find a specific room. There was a fan of ours who happened to watch our show online and, to quote them, "Loved us with all her heart." Her seven year old liked us, too, apparently-

but he was only given three weeks to live.

We stopped outside the one room. "Room 335." I sighed and wondered how a little kid could manage living in such a dull, drab environment. "This place doesn't look like it would inspire people to live," I muttered, my eyes growing wide as a doctor strode past and seemed to have heard me.

"Easy, Skigh," McKian joked. "Don't make too many enemies too fast."

My brown eyes rolled to white. "You honestly think I can control who my enemies are?"

"That would be nice."

I giggled as Mac knocked on the stuck door. From what we'd heard, this kid was really sick; we had on the protective stuff, whatever it was called, to be in this level, mainly because if you were here…

you usually never made it out.

"C-c-come in."

The voice was definitely a kid's but it was so quiet…

Mac shuddered. "How sick is he again?"

"He's not going to live much longer according to the doctors," I said hoarsely. I'd been praying- we both had- for him all week, the second we found out.

We stepped in, and I tried not to gasp and startle the tiny child lying in the bed, his thin body barely noticeable under the dull (and possibly blood-stained?) blankets. His blond hair was almost non-existent and his blue eyes were almost completely drained of color. His skin matched the white of the walls, but he was a cute little kid. "Hey, you're Elliott, right?"

The kid nodded, his pale face brightening a little. "Yeah. You're S-Skigh and M-McKian, aren't you?"

I smiled and didn't even have to glance at Mac to know he was smiling too. "Yeah."

"Your hair's different," Elliott managed before coughing into his little hospital gown.

I nodded. "Yep."

"I like it better this way. Can you make it stay that way forever?"

I laughed. "I'll try."

Elliott grinned, turning from his side to his back on the bed. He had some sort of cancer, but I'd forgotten the specific name. What I did remember was that this poor little kid was running out of time.

And fast.

As we stayed with him, playing with the only toy he had, a little blue monster truck, I noticed how well McKian and Elliott got along. Mac was good with kids.

Really shouldn't have been surprised by that but I was anyway.

As a nurse walked in, her overly sweet voice nearly made me hurl. I sat on the bed, holding Elliott's ghost of a hand as the nurse slipped a gleaming needle under his skin. He shivered and I felt his tiny hand squeeze mine tighter.

McKian walked out of the room. I looked up from Elliott for a second, then glanced back at him through the open dusty blinds on the window; his watch glowed bright green, like it rarely did, and he covered the screen with his hand. I saw him stare at his hands intently, like he was waiting for something.

Elliott laughed. "Your eyes."

I turned back to face him and gasped. "What?"

"They're gold! They're glowing!" He grinned.

The brunette nurse's dark chocolate face was level with Elliott's as she knelt by the bed. She grinned. "That's cute, sweetie, but-" she stopped and gaped as she saw he was right. I could feel the warmth in my face as my eyes glowed. "Wow, he's right."

I shrugged. "It's a natural thing," I said, laughing as Elliott reached towards my face.

The nurse stood and brushed herself off, her round frame decked in white. "I haven't seen him this happy in a while," she mumbled, watching as I tickled Elliott's ear and he giggled. "I wish every kid could just walk out of here, but some…" she shook her head.

As she left, McKian walked back in, his hands behind his back.

Elliott pulled himself up so he was in my lap. "What's b-behind your b-back?"

McKian smiled and brought his hands out from behind him. He opened his hands and I stared in awe as a light cycle about four inches big tumbled onto the bed. The blue lights even glowed like a real one.

Elliott grabbed it and his smile got bigger, which I didn't know was possible. "Woah! Where'd y-you get it? What i-is it?"

"A light cycle." McKian smiled.

Elliott ran his fingers over the wheels, the black treads a harsh contrast against his pasty skin.

"And you can have it."

Elliott nearly dropped it. "What?"

McKian smiled. "It's yours."

"Thanks!" Elliott handled it like it was going to shatter if he dropped it.

I watched McKian stand up and press his hands against one of the machines on the bed. Mac's hands glowed and he turned away from us so neither of us could see what he was doing.

I just hoped he knew what he was doing.

What was he doing?

…

"Tonight at the children's hospital right behind me, dozens of terminal cases have been mysterious taken a turn. Many parents are here, getting to take their children home for what looks like for good…"

I stared at the radio, the blue screen with the controls in my Roadster showing the fluctuating volume. I hit the brakes, hard. "So that's what you did?"

McKian shrugged. "I didn't know I'd triggered every machine. I thought it was only Elliott's."

Wow… "So, you sent your healing energy stuff through the entire children's hospital?"

Mac nodded, looking a little scared. "Yeah… not intentionally."

"Mac, this is great! Why are you nervous?"

"I don't want anyone to find out that it was me," he mumbled, turning away, shaking and embarrassed.

I frowned and rubbed his arm, making the turn with my one hand. "Mac, it's fine. And no one's gonna even remotely think that you shot stuff through the systems."

Mac shrugged. "Let's hope not. But I was controlling the healing energy. It's shouldn't have gone that far."

"That's not bad though." Flipped on the turn signal.

McKian nodded in agreement. "I know. But it was like it wasn't me… maybe it was-"

"I have no idea how He does it," I answered, already sensing McKian's theory as it took form.

And it was a very good, and pretty logical theory, in my mind.

* * *

_so... there's one more chapter left in this story, but in a week (possibly 2, depending on if my allergies kill me first...) the next one will be up. i'll put the cover on my twitter account when it's done. thanks, God's Great Dance Floor, for the most recent reviews :) you are a great friend :)_

_now, if you'll excuse me, i'm going to go smash my alarm clock. blasted thing, always waking me up early..._


	35. Chapter 34

(Skigh's POV)

**"The princess in her flower bed pulled the jungle underground, where cherry bombs stained the blackbirds red, and explosions never make a sound. Oh comet, come down! Kamikaze over me- and I come alive- my midnight melody. Oh comet, come down…"**

"You turn that up any louder and I swear-"

"WHAT?!" I couldn't hear Skigh over the music in the living room. McKian had his glowing hands pressed against the super computer, blue and white and green sparks tickling his hands; his eyes sparkled and glowed.

Knight rolled his eyes. "What in the world are you doing?" he screamed as I turned the volume down a notch.

"Oh, just interrupting a public service announcement, courtesy of CLU," I smirked and watched as McKian, with his left hand glued to the screen, tapped the controls, his dancing fingers creating a brilliant light show. Irritating CLU was fun. Really should've done it more often.

**"My captain on a snowy horse is coming back to take me home. I'm finally fighting back a terrible force 'cause I'm not afraid to die alone. Oh comet, come down! Kamikaze over me- and I come alive- my midnight melody…"**

I jumped as RAM flopped her furry little body onto my foot, a red and blue sock draped over her head. "Knight?"

"Yeah?" Knight got up from the couch.

"I think you should keep your socks on your feet and off the bunnies. The smell might be lethal for them." I threw his sock at his head.

He grabbed the holey sock as part of it landed in his mouth. He spat and gagged, several pieces of stinky sock landing on the floor in pools of saliva. "Yeah, that is nasty."

**"Oh comet, come down! Kamikaze over me- and I come alive- my midnight melody. Oh comet, come down…"**

"So, you're going to destroy the ears of everyone with ears on the Grid?" Knight inquired, a huge smirk filling his face as he stared at the view screens we'd pulled up.

I frowned as he winced, the light pouring from his pale hands; by now, he should be in the floor in a heap; he was only wincing, and the first time months ago when he'd done this, he almost passed out.

**"Break down the open road. Maybe I'll ride- and fight back the overtow to save my life. Bring in the amber glow. Maybe I'll fly- and go where you wanna go with your eagle eye…"**

Knight snickered. "Oh, they look thrilled." He froze. "Hey, is Tron gonna know you did this?"

"Eventually." I jumped. Man, why in the world did he do that every stinking time he walked into this place?!

I laughed. "Hello, Mr. Alan Bradley." I pointed above our heads, up and over the stage. "There is a door, you know. And there is such a thing as knocking."

Alan stuck his hands in his jeans pockets. I'd never seen him in jeans; the guy was always wearing some stuffy suit. "And there is such a thing as playing music too loud."

Knight shrugged innocently. "I told them."

"What...?" Alan turned, then looked down and smiled. "Okay, I'm buying different shoes." J. D. was chewing off the end of his shoelace, the end frayed.

Knight rolled his eyes. "So his feet are delicious and mine aren't?"

I kept a straight face and stared at him. "Well, I mean what I say, and I'm pretty stinking sincere, when I say I can smell your blasted socks all the way over here."

Alan and McKian burst out laughing. I just smirked as Knight's dark skin turned darker than I ever thought possible. Knight laughed too as Jump Drive hopped over, licked his sock, and then frantically started rubbing his glowing paws over his tiny pink tongue.

I glanced back at the screen and noticed Zed, Mara and the rest of Beck's co-workers. I felt bad for them having to leave the garage; all the more reason to choke Pavel and suck the life out of him. Well, not like there was any life in him to begin with.

**"We are the travelers, we look to the ever after. We are the strangers, we're practically endangered…"**

Knight sighed. "Okay, who changed the song?"

"You seriously think we're going to let "Kamikaze" play a billion times over and over?" Shook my head.

"Well, who picked this song?"

McKian's face turning red and his cute little sheepish smile gave him away. He peeled his eyes away from the screen and his smile grew. I followed his gaze and saw J. D. licking his black sneakers, his little bitty tongue running over the fabric on the edge of the high tops. RAM hopped over too and started sniffing his shoelaces.

Alan looked at the screen and frowned; I was shocked at how much his expression matched that of Tron's the overwhelming majority of the time. "Who's that?" He pointed at one of the now two dozen view screens.

**"We make our moves in mysterious ways. We'd rather burn up than stick to the shade. Not of this world so we live on the run- we keep our eyes set on what is to come…"**

McKian, at Alan's urging, enlarged that particular screen and Alan's eyebrows connected. "Is that-"

"Yes." It was Tron and Beck, standing on a building over the city, watching as the programs below started listening to the music more and more; they seemed to be enjoying it, unlike CLU and his minions. Beck had on the white suit, and Tron was in his black suit with the minimal lights.

Alan tapped the screen and it zoomed in, closing in on the pair observing our little interruption. "If that's Tron," he began, pointing at Beck, "then who's the other guy?"

"Tron." Even Alan was convinced that Beck was the real deal Tron. And if you could convince the creator of Tron, then it must be pretty believable. "I'm dead serious," I added, watching as Alan's stare jumped back and forth between Beck and Tron. Thankfully,the music would continue on it's own from one of my playlists. (My iPod comes in handy… once in a while.) So, even if we had to close out of my playlist, Mac had it set to run automatically, without the public service announcement or the songs changes showing on the clear- blue- black massive hunk of computer screen.

"So… that's his successor?" Alan shrugged. "Could've fooled me. And I created him!"

I motioned for Mac to remove Beck's helmet, as well as Tron's. McKian covered Tron's head in the picture with his hand, and the mask fell away in pieces, the black shining surface gone. He took a couple deep breaths and started removing Beck's mask as well. He had barely begun to break the mask into removable pieces when his hand broke away from the screen, the green glow dying. "Mac, you okay?"

McKian shook, sweat starting to roll down his face. "I'm fine," he mumbled, reaching up again and reconnecting himself with the computer; before any of Beck's mask had time to dissolve as Tron's had, Alan gently grabbed his arm and pulled him away from the computer, supporting Mac so he wouldn't fall over.

"No, you're not." Alan made him sit on the couch, watching his now dull green eyes stare off into space. "What's wrong?"

Mac took couple deep breaths and stood up. "I'm fine." He looked better now; probably had just overdone it with the whole computer connection thing that made no sense to me.

There was still a lot that I needed to make sense of.

…

"So, I'm eighteen, right?"

I nodded, staring at McKian as he ruffled RAM's long hair, the bunny pressing her tiny paws into Mac's shirt and stomach. "Yeah, why?"

"Just making sure I knew my age. Sorry."

Blasted habit of his! I was going to get him to stop apologizing for no apparent reason even if it killed me.

Mac grinned at Jump Drive in his lap. J. D.'s little tongue hung out of his mouth, pressed against the brown stitching on McKian's shorts as he slept; his ears were lopsided, and his tiny glowing nose twitched. "So… that means I have a driver's liscense, right?"

Nodded at him. "Yeah, it's listed in your file that you do. But the rules of the road here are no where near the rules on the Grid." I stared at the paperwork in my lamp; in order to do an interview with the president, I have to fill out a stack of paperwork that was bigger than me.

Yay, no chance on making Knight forge my signature for this.

McKian picked his Coke can off the coffee table and nearly dropped it, managing to keep the sticky (and permanent staining liquid) from hitting the small red area rug and the grey leather of the couch. "You okay?" I asked, sitting up as he started shaking; I grabbed his half-drank soda from him and set the can on the table, the condensation from the midday May heat pouring through the windows making water run down the sides.

Mac shook his head and started tapping his watch, the screen glowing that rare green color that either made me excited, or nervous enough to puke. "Something's not right…" he kept hammering on the screen, and I stared in awe as the crack, which I was sure had gotten much worse in the last few seconds from him hitting the screen so stinking hard, was gone.

But the flashing? The now white hot blinding light pouring from his watch and creeping along his pitch black tattoos and hands?

Nope, that was there.

I closed my eyes and, after what felt like years had ticked by, I pried them open and saw most of the light gone, but McKian was now standing, his whole body racked with near-convulsions as he kept tapping the watch screen frantically. "What-"

"I don't know what's going on!" he screamed, his hands starting to glow again as he moved his long, pale fingers faster than ever before. "But the watch might destabilize!" And that would mean he'd probably die… and I could, too.

Great...

By now Knight had returned from picking up more paper plates and cups (geez, I leave two guys alone for an hour with paper cups and they destroy all of them- Good Lord only knows what was racing through their confusing minds). He dropped the two blue pastil bags, which only added to the noises of alarm and denied access from Mac's watch. "What happened?"

McKian rolled his eyes, shaking even more as he kept trying to enter codes and hack passwords. "I don't know." He kept trying over and over to block, or open, or prevent, or hack, or whatever he was doing the last few blasted minutes. "I think something's coming through the interface we have here in your computer!" He winced as his hands glowed more and more.

A bright flash erupted from the watch and then the beeping and flashing and glowing stopped.

McKian fell back onto the couch, barely missing J. D. as he hopped out of the way. "Okay, whatever that was, it's gone, blocked, destroyed. At least I hope it is."

A loud thud rocked the floor; the entire structure of the massive auditorium shook. "And that sounds like my room," I muttered, racing to the door with Knight and McKian right behind me, Knight's sharp-soled sneakers cutting into my bare feet once or twice.

As I threw open the metal grey door, I froze and pressed my palms against the icy doorway in shock; Knight and McKian bumped into me, but not hard enough to make me let go. "Oh, this is NOT good…" I mumbled, trying to send the message from my brain to my gloved fingers to pinch the other arm.

That wasn't working.

The glow emanating from the floor wasn't anything good; my stomach tied itself in knots as the pulsing orange and red seemed to magnify.

I could feel Mac's gaze pouring over my shoulder, his nervous breath down my back. "Oh no… we are so dead."

"Why? What-" Knight pushed my arm down and gasped. "Yep, we're dead."

* * *

_i am evil person! X) but that's the end of Kamikaze and, i'll say in about a week and a half, the next story will be posted :)  
_

_a summary of the next story is on my profile in case the week and a half thing gets a little annoying. (sorry- a huge school event is coming up and i got recruited for part of it. yay me... i'm just hoping i don't inhale too many sharpie marker fumes.)_

_thanks for all the reviews, guys! i never expected that big of a response. it was nice to see everyone's opinions, and it was definitely encouraging :)_

_hey, any of you awesome people out there want the smashed remains of my alarm clock? ;)_

_-lyrics from Owl City "Kamikaze" and TobyMac "Unstoppable" (seriously- two of the greatest songs EVER.)_


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